To Overthrow a Government With Beer: Trumpism in Latin America
May 11, 2016
To Overthrow a Government With Beer: Trumpism in Latin America
by Maria Paez Victor
Yet another multibillionaire wants to run a country: Lorenzo Mendoza. He is a member of one of the most rich and powerful families of Venezuela and is positioning himself to be president – not by votes, but by stealth, by economic warfare against the democratic government of Venezuela.
USA-educated Mendoza is considered the richest man in the country with a fortune of $5 billion and ranked among the 500 richest people in the world by Forbes magazine (2016). He is using the power of the 75- year industry, which his father and grandfather built up through their crooked and intimate link to the previous anti-democratic governments, to overthrow the government of Nicolás Maduro.
His weapons of preference to discredit and destabilize the government are the foodstuffs he imports, packages and sells, especially the beer. Very little of what his industry does is actually produced in the country. Polar does not invest its gains in the country just parks it in foreign banks. Polar processes and packs imported corn, rice, tuna, tomato paste so that the government classifies its industry as “necessary” and worthy to receive dollars. It is a parasitic enterprise.
The item that is key in this economic war is his beer, Polar. It is considered one of the 10 best beers in Latin America. He is threatening to close the production of beer because the government, which controls the exchange, will not GIVE him the dollars he says he need to import barley. Mendoza is threatening to fire 10,000 workers plus the loss of 300 indirect jobs if the government does not hand over the dollars he wants. It is called: blackmail.
More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/05/11/to-overthrow-a-government-with-beer-trumpism-in-latin-america/
