Anne Malherbe, First Lady of Ecuador

Anne Malherbe is the wife of President Rafael Correa of Ecuador since 1992.

Belgian nationality and origin Namur, it was during her studies at the Catholic University of Louvain, she met her future husband.

Anne Malherbe teaches at the French lycée in Quito and has three children.

During the campaign of the 2006 presidential election, she standed aloof from politics and media, allowing only a few interviews to the press. During the latter declaring that she has no knowledge of politics, not wanting to play a role, and be reluctant to shoulder the burden of first lady, considering that people vote for one candidate and not for his wife. She refuses to take direction from the National Institute of Child and Family (INNFA), load traditionally vested in the President’s wife.

On July 29, 2007, Anne Malherbe private trip to Belgium stands against the confinement for a month and the expulsion of two Ecuadorian (Ana CAJAMAR and daughter of eleven years, Angelica). A few days after Rafael Correa visited them at the detention center 127a Steenokkerzeel, she declars that she is being ashamed to be Belgian in this situation.

A few days later, during an interview with a Spanish news agency, she denounces the hypocritical immigration policy and practices “specific to the Gestapo” the Belgian authorities. These statements are deemed “offensive” and “unfounded” by the Belgian Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht, who is well-Anne Malherbe Belgian nationality and is expressed in his own name, summoned the ambassador of Ecuador.

Subsequently, Anne Malherbe said his words had been taken out of context and that she had never intended to equate the police methods used to those of the Gestapo, she reacted as a mother and had never taken a course of diplomacy.