Maria Corina Machado has hiked overpasses, walked highways, ridden motorcycles, sought shelter in supporters' homes, and seen her closest collaborators detained and persecuted as she has crisscrossed Venezuela. The ruling party has blocked Machado from running in Sunday's hotly contested presidential election, but fueled by that ban, she has become the driving force for the main opposition coalition and a symbol of perseverance for millions of Venezuelans, per the AP. Machado, once a political outcast, is their freedom fighter and the main threat to President Nicolás Maduro's reelection aspirations. Though she herself is not on the ballot, she is backing the main opposition candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, in Sunday's vote.
Supporters scream "Freedom! Freedom! Freedom!" as the 56-year-old mother of three arrives at rallies and while she speaks, some overwhelmed to the point of tears. The thousands-strong crowds include opponents of the self-professed socialist revolution that Maduro's predecessor began at the turn of the century, as well as voters who supported those ideals but abandoned them because of Venezuela's ongoing crisis. As the AP details in a profile, Machado's road to leadership has been long and winding. The industrial engineer and daughter of a steel magnate began challenging the ruling party in 2004, when the non-governmental organization she co-founded, Súmate, promoted a referendum to recall then-President Hugo Chávez.
The initiative failed, and Machado and other Súmate executives were charged with conspiracy. A year later, she drew the anger of Chávez and his allies again for traveling to Washington to meet President George W. Bush in the Oval Office. Chávez considered Bush an adversary. She formally entered the political arena in 2010 when she was elected to a seat in the National Assembly, receiving more votes than any aspiring lawmaker ever. It was from this position that she boldly interrupted Chávez as he addressed the legislature and called his expropriation of businesses theft. "An eagle does not hunt a fly," he responded. The exchange is seared in voters' memories.
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Machado is a "symbol of resistance to the regime," said Michael Shifter, an academic and former president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington-based think tank. Her efforts to challenge the ruling party have earned her the admiration of many voters who see her as the "instrument for a transformation in Venezuela," Shifter said. Read the full profile.
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