Calderon Considering Post-Presidential Life Outside Mexico The Washington Post
go to original July 1, 2012

President Felipe Calderón

MEXICO CITY — In meetings, President Felipe Calderón has been telling guests that he and his family are likely to leave Mexico to live abroad after his term expires in December. It will be too dangerous to remain, he warns in private conversation, because powerful drug mafias might come after him.

For the commander in chief of Mexico’s U.S.-backed drug war to suggest he has not provided enough security to live in his country is a stunning revelation — and may be seen as either an admission of failure or evidence of just how hard he has fought and how far Mexico needs to go.

As Mexicans go to the polls today to vote for his successor, Calderón finds his legacy battered, his ruling party unpopular and its standard-bearer, the energetic former education secretary Josefina Vázquez Mota, trailing in third place in the pre-election surveys.

Limited to a single six-year term, Calderón remains personally popular, with his ratings hovering around 50 percent. Yet two of every three Mexicans recently surveyed say the country is headed in the wrong direction. According to a spokesman, Calderón is “considering a variety of options both at home and abroad … to contribute to finding solutions to global problems.” They say “security will not be a factor.”

The election, said the pollster Roy Campos, “appears to be about change.”

Last week, in a ceremony attended by the U.S. ambassador and Calderón’s top drug warriors, Calderón pleaded with the next administration to continue his fight against organized crime. “We cannot throw away everything that has been done,” he warned.

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