Mexico's president becomes TV adventure

President Felipe Calderon is figuratively going out on a limb — and literally down a sinkhole, up a river (with a paddle) and over the top of a few pyramids — in an attempt to boost Mexico's flagging tourism industry. The balding, 49-year-old leader is personally trying to change his country's violent reputation by appearing as a sort of adventure tour guide in a series of TV programmes to be broadcast starting in September on Public Broadcasting Service stations in the United States. The president dons an Indiana Jones-style hat and a harness and descends a rope into the 375-metre Sotano de las Golondrinas cavern, accompanied by Peter Greenberg, host of the The Royal Tour TV series. Calderon also straps on scuba tanks to lead Greenberg into a sinkhole lake known as a cenote in Yucatan. And he helps a Lacandon Indian paddle a boat down a river in a jungle in southern Chiapas state. In the 30-minute videos, Calderon breaks from his image as a lawyerly policy wonk best known for launching a bloody, controversial offensive against drug cartels. Article continues below Spreading the message He plans to attend a premiere of the show within a few weeks, according to Tourism Department spokesman Roberto Martinez. "I have other duties that are more dangerous," Calderon jokes, dangling midair in a cavern as a rope lowers him hundreds of feet to the bottom. The site is in the Gulf coast region of Mexico known as the Huasteca, which is covered in jungle and dotted with caverns, waterfalls and crystalline pools. Calderon's message in the latest videos is that Mexico is safe for tourists. "This is part of a strategy to promote the country abroad," said Martinez. Nobody argues that Mexico's tourism needs a boost. According to the country's central bank, overall foreign tourism in 2010, not including border-area visitors, was still 6.3 per cent below 2008 levels, and the first half of 2011 saw a 2 per cent decline from the same period of 2010. Cruise ship visits in the first half of the year declined 9.3 percent, after several cruise lines canceled Pacific port calls in Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta. Analysts blame the drops on the world economic downturn hitting many countries' travel industries, but also pointed to Mexico's drug violence, which has claimed between 35,000 and 40,000 lives since Calderon took office in late 2006. While foreign tourists have not been targets of the violence, a point Calderon is eager to make, it has had some undeniable effects. For example, the border highway that many U.S. visitors once used to travel to the Huasteca region where Calderon went cave-diving is now considered so plagued by highway holdups and shootings that the US State Department has issued warnings about traveling there. Some argue that Calderon's stint as a television travel guide might be ill-advised, both because it compromises the dignity of the presidency and comes just months before campaigning opens for the 2012 elections to choose his successor. Congresswoman Leticia Quezada of the Democratic Revolution Party said her party objects to Calderon using government vehicles and personnel for the series.