Ricardo Fernández Barrueco breaks his silence after 10 months of imprisonment. He claims he was demonized and attributes his situation to a power struggle within the Government.
“I believed in their national project where the leadership established that all Venezuelans would have equal opportunities and each would contribute to this project through their work. Unfortunately, politics took over the process, leading to an internal struggle among political groups, a fratricidal conflict within the Government itself that ultimately harmed it.”
Ricardo Fernández Barrueco reflects from the basement of the Military Intelligence Directorate, where he has been detained since November 20, 2009 (previously in Disip). His arrest followed the intervention of four banks that Fernández attempted to revive while under the supervision of the Superintendency of Banks.
No one could explain how the businessman, who organized the most comprehensive food program for the Bolivarian revolution after the 2002 strike, ended up imprisoned by the same Government he helped restore.
His lawyer, Gastón Saldivia, blames his situation on a conspiracy against Hugo Chávez that emerged from within the movement, aimed at destroying the most successful and efficient food program the Bolivarian revolution had developed. A program that reached 16 million people, and to achieve that, Saldivia asserts, it was necessary to eliminate Ricardo Fernández and his group of companies.
After 10 months in prison, this entrepreneur agreed for the first time to share his account of events and his perspective on the country’s situation.
Regarding the intervention of the four banks he acquired, the estimated financial loss for the businessman is over 6 billion bolívares fuertes, while his companies in Venezuela taken over by the Government are valued at 7 billion dollars.
He firmly denies that his growth as a businessman is due to the “alliance” attributed to him with Chávez’s Government. “I was demonized for my dedicated participation in food security.” He points out that before 1998 he was already a businessman with significant investments not only in Venezuela but also in the United States, Panama, Ecuador, and Spain, and he never received funding from the Government or any state bank.
He explains that between 2000 and 2006, the Government supported national companies, but after losing the constitutional reform elections, President Chávez activated mechanisms for complete control of the private food sector through the Enabling Law. “There was a politically critical moment that further radicalized antagonistic positions, using oil money to control all sectors of the economy that were in private hands.”
-Does the crisis of Pdval relate to the food import policy that displaced Venezuelan entrepreneurs?
–Between 2007 and 2008, Pdval was created, a food program whose marketing scheme competed with the private network of retail product sales. In contrast, Mercal was focused on providing 8 to 10 essential national products to the most marginalized sectors. Pdval utilized imports, supported by the oil industry due to its feasibility for accessing foreign exchange.
From my humble perspective, Pdval had a poor start due to the lack of a management structure that made the project viable according to national requirements. This program affected a population already served by the private food sector, leading to duplication in the acquisition of food and goods.
-What role did the Cubans play in the import network?
–The Cubans bear the greatest responsibility for the Pdval crisis; investigations conducted by media corroborate this.
-What is the current status of your food production and distribution companies?
–Currently, they are collapsing due to poor operations. They have been looted, their equipment cannibalized, causing distress among workers and associated producers. The estates have been robbed to the extent that the total damage is unknown. I had the second-largest genetic and production cattle in the country. Fourteen years of work have been dramatically lost. The fertile lands are now unproductive.
Fernández Barrueco before 1999
The businessman explains that he had developed his business from a young age, but became well-known due to the media campaign against the food program (Mercal) in which he claims he was merely a cog in the machine. “I was a medium-sized businessman in the agro-industrial sector dedicated to the production of sugarcane, corn, and rice, maintaining processing companies acquired during Rafael Caldera’s Government, like Proarepa, part of the Agricultural Marketing Corporation. At that time, I participated in the privatization process sponsored by the Venezuelan Investment Fund to acquire two sugar mills. My family owned land inherited from my grandfather, an immigrant who arrived in Venezuela in 1952 and settled to work in Turén. I also had companies in the fishing sector. However, my main economic activity was shipping and corporate fishing operations with groups from the United States and Europe, where I first worked as an employee and later became independent.”
1999 the best moment
He believes that 1999 should have been the moment for our country, as there was enthusiasm for Chávez’s victory, and despite the precarious conditions in rural Venezuela, the potential of its people remained intact, developed over three generations of agricultural, livestock, and moderately industrial production. “Only coherent political direction with a strategic and sustainable vision was needed.”
Although he confesses that “I did not vote for Hugo Chávez,” he recalls that with his victory in 1998, political changes began to emerge throughout the public sector. This encouraged many small and medium-sized entrepreneurs who, despite their own apprehensions about this change, saw a real opportunity in the new Venezuela.
At that time, Fernández highlights, President Chávez aimed to develop some social programs implemented by Rafael Caldera (Agenda Venezuela) in which he had participated as a businessman, and due to its significant impact, it caught the new President’s attention, who embraced and projected it. The goal was to target extreme poverty sectors and was assumed by the FAN.
In his opinion, traditional businesses did not believe in the proposed model.
The strike of 2002
For Fernández, that business sector, along with a political faction, acted “to our misfortune and that of the country” against the peace, tranquility, and quality of life of the Nation. “Thus, 2002 arrived, the power vacuum emerged, the coup d’état, and the disregard for the Constitution. Many entrepreneurs who accepted and participated in the agro-food sabotage stigmatized those they called new entrepreneurs, a group to which I belonged.”
During that time, he recalls, “I received many calls advising me to withdraw from the Government’s food programs. Upon my refusal, I even received death threats. They did not understand that my final customer was precisely the most marginalized population, not the Government.”
He explains that when the oil and food strike was executed, his group of companies, along with other entrepreneurs and producers, were requested by the FAN to face the food crisis. It was the FAN, along with 64 national and multinational companies, including American ones, who dismantled the country’s paralysis, safeguarding the population and maintaining necessary preparedness against any eventuality, natural or otherwise, threatening the population.
Called by the High Command
In March 2003, he was invited by the Military High Command as an advisor for designing the Mercal program.
He clarifies that his goal was not to compete with or destroy private food marketing companies, as has been stated, but to reach those sectors that could not afford to purchase basic foods. That’s why he believes the program had great acceptance because it catered to those sectors with quality products.
He attributes the success of the Mercal program that began the attacks against it, trying to diminish its effectiveness, sabotaging it, or discrediting it.
“For my collaboration in dismantling the oil strike, they fabricated charges against me, claiming I was a frontman for Government officials, including President Chávez and even his relatives, to suggest that my wealth and that of my companies were not the result of hard work but came from irregular activities.”
He clarifies that he has not received credits, money, or subsidies from the Government or the public financial system. His companies have been audited by U.S. agencies, demonstrating that their growth and funding come from sustained work, agricultural and industrial development.
-One of those private auditors, FTI from the U.S., states that you received a promissory note of 1.8 billion dollars from the Venezuelan Government.
–The information is false; I never worked with funding from the national public sector. My relationship with national and international private banking regarding credit requests for investment is also verified, which generated confidence in my name and that of my companies.
There was never a commission payment or intermediaries involved. Our activity did not require “lobbying,” and the profit margins are so small that to achieve them, one must work with high volumes, quality, and responsibility in the delivery times. In this context, there is no room for illicit activities.
Francisco Olivares