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iven her gender, she is certainly the wrong woman at the wrong time, but Yingluck Shinawatra can prove that she is the right woman at the right time to lead Thailand out of its many predicaments.

The Thai Parliament has elected 44-year-old Yingluck to become the country’s first woman prime minister. A virtual novice in public affairs, the businesswoman earned Thailand’s top political job after leading her Pheu Thai party to a landslide victory last month.

She passed the first test shortly after the election when she assembled a coalition with smaller parties to ensure an insurmountable majority in parliament. On Friday, the Thai parliament voted 296-3 to make her prime minister, with 197 abstaining. King Bhumibol Adulyadej must now endorse her election. The real challenges for Yingluck begin as soon as she moves into office.

She will need to reach out to all Thais, including the opposition Democratic Party (and its largely urban supporters), which Pheu Thai defeated at the polls, to end the deep division that had so destabilized the country for much of the past six years. Unlike the government of former prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva which was put in place by the military, Yingluck has greater popular, constitutional and moral legitimacy to lead.

She needs to establish a style of governing that is vastly different from the divisive and unscrupulous methods of her elder brother Thaksin, the prime minister who was ousted in a military coup in 2006. Thaksin had a hand in the creation of Pheu Thai and in engineering her to chair the party, but he would undermine her authority and legitimacy if he tried to dictate to her from Dubai, where he lives in exile.

Yingluck’s biggest challenge is putting Thailand back on the path of economic growth. The endless street battles between the red-shirt and yellow-shirt supporters discouraged investors and, although the economy was still growing, it was far less than its true potential. Indonesia looks forward to a more democratic, stable and prosperous Thailand.

Not exactly a job for an inexperienced woman to meet these challenges, some sexists will say? On the contrary, there is always a first time, and this is as good as any for Thailand. Growing weary of the old divisive politics, Thai voters knew exactly what they were getting into when they elected Pheu Thai. Their votes say that this is precisely the time for a woman to take over the helm.

We wish her luck, and in the traditional Thai greeting, Sawadee Ms. Yingluck.