By Nora Boustany

Friday; Page A25

Imagine yourself president of Mexico's largest political party -- a party thrown out of power after 71 years -- and having to watch from the sidelines the glittering
welcome President Vicente Fox received during his state visit to Washington this week.

"It is not comfortable," said Mexican senator Dulce Maria Sauri, president of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI. Though graciously stepping into the
shadows as an opposition member of the official delegation, Sauri used gaps in the schedule to meet with players on the Hill, journalists and representatives of
PowellTate, a public relations firm retained to promote the PRI's internal reforms and its next national convention. She met Wednesday with Rep. Jim Kolbe
(R-Ariz.), chairman of the U.S.-Mexico interparliamentary group, to invite him and other legislators to the PRI assembly in November.

"We have to look at the past and we have to apologize for our mistakes," Sauri noted. "But the past cannot be our only focus. Power chips away at you with time.
As a party we are looking toward improving our image and also to test how Mexico is constructed in the minds of American citizens."

"If we want to go back to power, we have to learn a lot from being in the opposition," she said. "Having been in power, we want to be a responsible opposition with
an eye on what is good for Mexico."

Growing up in Merida, the capital of Yucatan state, Sauri loved to climb to the top of the fruit trees in her parents' back yard with the boys in the neighborhood. Her
younger sister would come along, but Sauri was leader of the pack in the cactus-studded land of her childhood. She was nurtured on stories of her maternal
grandmother, Ramona, who took a ship to Cuba when she was 15 to work as a seamstress to help provide for her 11 siblings after her father was killed in the
Mexican Revolution.

Sauri's father disapproved of her career in politics "but I did it anyway because it is a way to change the world," she explained. The sociology major was elected to
the lower house of Mexico's Congress, before becoming a senator, governor of Yucatan, PRI state president and then the party's national head in 1999.

Since Fox's election last year, Sauri has spoken out against some of his policies: the withdrawal of army troops from Chiapas, the privatization of Mexico's petroleum
company and Federal Electricity Commission and the appointment of only three female cabinet ministers. In a country where women's clout is growing despite a
macho culture, her gender has not gained under Fox, she said.

"But just because we are members of the PRI does not mean we have to fight President Fox on every issue," she said during an interview at the Hay-Adams hotel
Wednesday. "I think we can go along on some that are good for Mexico, like migration, even if we don't agree on all the details."

Sauri said Fox wanted to send a signal about Mexico's political diversity by becoming the first president to bring members of the political opposition on a state visit.

Despite the awkwardness of blending into Fox's entourage, Sauri attended the White House state dinner Wednesday in Yucatan's native white and cross-stich
embroidered dress -- and loved every minute of it, she admitted the next morning. She was seated at the second most important table along with Secretary of State
Colin L. Powell, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's brother.

The next Mexican presidential election, in 2006, is a long way off, and Sauri said she was not thinking beyond the next month or year leading up to lower house
elections in 2003, in which the PRI is hoping to increase its seats.

"She would have been a terrific caudilla, a chieftain on horseback who can command the troops, a primitive leader who exerts power by sheer force of will," said a
veteran analyst of Mexican affairs who knows her and acknowledges her "effectiveness and leadership." The analyst added: "She was great in the old Mexico. The
question is: Will she be great in the new Mexico?"

When Sauri became president of the Inter-American Commission of Women at the Organization of American States in 1998, many hoped she would turn it around.
OAS Secretary General Cesar Gaviria described her as "very capable" with political and administrative skills. "I don't know if she will have a bigger role. I hope she
can contribute to strengthening democracy in Mexico," he said.

Her husband of 30 years, Jose Luis Sierra, supported her professionally and picked up the parenting slack as she absented herself for months to campaign, raise
funds and network. "Only a very intelligent man, with a strong personality, can be the husband of a woman like me," Sauri said. "Most women in politics are single,
widowed or divorced."

Carmen Lomellin, executive secretary of the Inter-American Commission of Women at the OAS, described Sauri as "savvy and sharp." As president of the
commission, Sauri repeatedly got Mexican views across without ruffling feathers, said Lomellin, the U.S. delegate. "People walked out thinking it was their idea. She
has this innate sense for dismantling uncomfortable situations," Lomellin observed.

Sauri asserts that she is not flustered by Fox's stardom. "A star shines until it burns out," she said.

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