JAMAICA: She defeated three formidable male rivals to lead her party with the campaign slogan "Come to Mama". On the streets of her poor district she's known as "Sister P". Portia Simpson-Miller played the gender card to gain the prime minister's office she assumed yesterday.
It has gone over well with voters tired of the corrupt, old-boy political circles that have ruled as this Caribbean nation slides deeper into poverty.
Expectations are high that Ms Simpson-Miller (60) will offer a fresh start for troubled Jamaica because she enjoys cross-party popularity in a country long divided into two hostile camps: the ruling People's National Party, which assured her the prime minister's post by electing her its leader last month, and the opposition Jamaica Labor Party.
But political analysts have been quick to point out that the first woman to govern Jamaica is a product of the entrenched party hierarchy that probably will prove difficult to reform.
"She's a naturally compassionate person, that's her strength," political science professor Brian Meeks of the University of the West Indies said of the politician who succeeds PJ Patterson.
"But her weakness is that nothing has changed in Jamaica. There are powerful expectations of her, and there will be intense frustration if Mama, as she has come to be known, doesn't deliver."
Jamaica is afflicted with violent crime, strangling public debt, a brain drain that has seen 85 per cent of university graduates emigrate and declining living standards, despite revenue from tourism and from mining and refining bauxite.
Although she is wildly popular in the gritty slums around Kingston, Ms Simpson-Miller comes into the leadership with political baggage.
As the cabinet member responsible for local government since 2002, she oversaw a network of social services that has largely been supplanted in some urban communities by criminal gangs that control patronage, providing jobs and other benefits.
Coming from one of the poorest and most violence-prone areas, she rode into office with the backing of what one senior diplomat described as "some very scary people". Politics has often been a blood sport in Jamaica, where hundreds die in politically driven gang clashes before each election.
Analysts insist that reform of the political system is a necessary first step to any improvement in public safety, which could lead to more private investment and relief from 16 per cent unemployment and an increasing poverty rate.
Supporters see Ms Simpson-Miller's victory over three better-educated rivals from the political elite as a reflection of the desire of poor Jamaicans to be led by someone who has walked in their shoes. People from across the political spectrum also have hailed the rise of a woman as part of a diversifying trend in the hemisphere.
"It was time for a change," said Kenneth Brown, marketing director for an air ambulance service here. "Women are better able to resolve problems and are less prone to violence."
Ms Simpson-Miller has said little about how she plans to clean up a government reputedly at the head of shakedown schemes.