Show of wealth snares ex-president Fox

In a picture of self fulfillment as well as romance, Vicente Fox and his wife, Marta Sahagun, gaze at each other beside a new lake constructed in their extensive grounds. Behind, their ranch-turned-mansion shows off gilded carpets, a desk with stone horse heads for legs, and life-sized portraits of themselves on the walls. The photographs, published in the magazine Quien, fit perfectly with the sugary ethos of a celebrity journal in Mexico. But this peep at the post-presidential idyll has sparked outrage beyond. "The photos show that he got rich during his six years in office, in a very shameless and cynical way," Lino Korrodi, Fox's former chief campaign fundraiser, said in one interview of the former president. Leading the chorus of disapproval, Korrodi claims that as a candidate Fox was a terrible businessman, permanently in financial straits and keeper of a simple house with servants paid for out of campaign funds. His accusations have prompted calls by some deputies for a congressional investigation into Fox's apparently lavish new wealth. Hailed as a hero of democracy when he defeated 71 years of one-party rule in elections in 2000, Fox left the presidential office last November vilified by much of the press. At best, he was accused of living in a fantasy world dubbed Foxilandia and of ignoring the need to shore up democracy. At worst he was charged with orchestrating an electoral fraud favoring his party colleague, the current president, Felipe Calderón Hinojosa. Fox was also much maligned for promoting his wife's political ambitions, and failing to rein in the alleged influence-peddling and lifestyle excesses of her sons from a former marriage. But rather than slip into the background, as most former Mexican presidents have done, Fox and Sahagun have continued to search out the limelight with the same sugary rhetoric that characterized their public statements while he was in power. "Affection for my country obliges me to remain close to the people in Mexico and abroad to help them," Fox says in the Quien interview. "There is no way I am going to stay gathering dust hidden away inside my house." Modeling their "dream" on former US presidents, in particular Bill Clinton, Fox and his wife are planning to build a presidential library. Meanwhile, the English version of his memoirs, entitled Revolution of Hope, is due out next month. Written with the help of a political consultant, Rob Allyn, the book reportedly includes a description of President Bush as "the cockiest guy I have ever met in my life," and the revelation that the US president is frightened of riding big horses. Fox has also thrown himself into the US lecture circuit. He all but admitted this year that he had meddled in the elections and was proud of it, causing serious embarrassment for President Calderón.