By Patrick Markey

NEIVA, Colombia, March 21 (Reuters) - A grenade blasted Cielo Gonzalez's home, her father narrowly survived a kidnap attempt and she recently escaped a car bomb attack.

As the prominent mayor of Neiva city near Colombia's drugs heartland, leftist guerrillas want Gonzalez dead to send a message that President Alvaro Uribe's U.S.-backed security campaign is failing.

Killing Gonzalez would rid the guerrillas of a staunch Uribe supporter in a province that has traditionally been a rebel stronghold and a corridor to important drug-producing areas in the south.

Earlier this month, guerrillas managed to sneak two bombs close to a radio station where she was speaking. One car bomb exploded after a bodyguard ordered the suspicious vehicle towed away; the other, hidden in a pipe nearby, failed to go off.

"If that bomb had gone off then, there would be no trace of Cielo Gonzalez," she told Reuters recently. "If they kill Neiva's mayor then they kill off institutions, kill off democracy, it tells the government its project has failed."

Gonzalez has nine months left as mayor and says she will not back down by resigning. She is Colombia's most protected woman politician with more bodyguards than some government ministers.

Violence and urban attacks have dropped off sharply since Uribe took office in 2002 vowing to combat the illicit drug trade and rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, with the help of billions in U.S. aid.

But with elections for mayors and governors set for October, rebel bombings and threats in Neiva highlight the complex task Uribe faces stamping out violence from Latin America's oldest guerrilla insurgency.

Gonzalez has ten bodyguards and travels with motorcycle guards and three armored cars. Bomb dogs check buildings she visits and two officers with M-16 rifles perch in a green sandbag bunker behind her house.

"I used to jog everyday and that is out, prohibited now because it is the routine that kills," she said. "I know I have to put up with this until I finish my mandate."

STRATEGIC CORRIDOR

Uribe has sent out troops to retake areas once under the control of illegal armed groups. Rebels have been driven back into the jungles and 31,000 right-wing paramilitaries who once fought the guerrillas have disarmed in a peace deal.

Neiva, a steamy city of 300,000 people about 190 miles (300 km) south of Bogota in Huila province, has suffered its share of violence involving the paramilitaries and rebels, who are both involved in the lucrative cocaine trade.

Guerrillas stormed an upscale Neiva building in 2001 and snatched a senator, his family and twelve others. Rebels once planned to use mortars to shoot down Uribe's plane as he arrived in the city in 2003.

Those darker days are gone as Gonzalez and other mayors of small Colombian cities seek to attract tourism and investment for construction projects and development as the economy booms and security improves.

But Huila remains a key drug transport corridor from nearby rural Cauca and Narino provinces, where illicit coca leaf is grown for cocaine production.

"Huila is one of the three strongholds of the FARC, where they have traditionally had civilian support and networks," said Pablo Casas, an analyst at Bogota think tank Security and Democracy.

Last February, rebels burst into a Huila hotel and massacred seven town councilors and wounded more as they dined. Five Huila lawmakers are still being held by guerrillas.

"Their objective is to intimidate, discourage and create fear," said Huila police commander Col. Miguel Angel Bojaca.

Gonzalez was broadcasting a weekly radio program at the start of the month when the FARC tried to set off the car bomb. One bodyguard noticed a suspicious vehicle and ordered it towed away. It exploded blocks away, wounding ten people.

Two days later, police found a second explosive tucked away in a pipe outside the radio station. It was positioned just where Gonzalez had stood, but failed to explode. It then went off when police removed it, killing five people.

"Sometimes I ask what am I doing, why don't I just leave?," Gonzalez said, but she insists she will not give up. "From the start, I was always clear that I would keep going."

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