Luis Alberto Lacalle de Herrera, GCMG (; Lacalle locally or ; born 13 July 1941), is a Uruguayan politician and lawyer who served as President of Uruguay from 1990 to 1995. Background His mother, María Hortensia de Herrera de Lacalle, was the daughter of the White political leader Luis Alberto de Herrera, after whom Lacalle was named. Luis Alberto Lacalle joined the National Party at the age of 17. In 1961 he started working as a journalist for Clarín and he graduated from the University of the Republic's law school in 1964. In 1971, he was elected deputy for Montevideo and kept his seat until the 1973 coup, when President Juan María Bordaberry dissolved parliament. Assassination attempt In August 1978 Lacalle was sent three bottles of wine tainted with poison addressed to himself and two fellow National Party members (Heber and Pereyra) who had been trying to negotiate a way out of the military regime. Lacalle's wife warned him against the suspicious gift, but Heber's wife drank a glass, dying immediately. The case remains unsolved. Vice-President of Senate When democracy was restored in 1984 he was elected senator, and became vice-president of the Senate. President of Uruguay 1989 election In 1989 he ran for the presidency for his faction, Herrerismo, with running-mate Gonzalo Aguirre. In the subsequent elections in November 1989, the National Party defeated the rival Colorado Party (running with several presidential candidates: Jorge Batlle, Jorge Pacheco Areco and Hugo Fernández Faingold) and Broad Front (running with presidential candidate Líber Seregni). Lacalle received the most votes within his party, defeating Carlos Julio Pereyra and Alberto Zumarán, and thus was elected President of Uruguay, taking office on March 1, 1990 for a five-year term. Tenure Upon taking office, Lacalle sent parliament a tax reform bill which was immediately passed with the support of the Colorado Party. Sales tax were increased from 21% to 22% income tax was increased and a few other taxes were created. During his rule, he encouraged a free market program, participated in the Brady bonds plan to alleviate foreign debt obligations, and was a co-founder of the Mercosur, along with the presidents of Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina, which came into effect with the Treaty of Asunción in 1991. In 1992, support for his economic reforms suffered a heavy blow when one of his most significant initiatives, a plan to privatize Uruguay's state-owned companies, was rejected by