One of such banks is the North International Bank (NIB), based in Antigua, but controlled by Venezuelan executives. In August 2016, the Venezuelan Superintendency of Banking Institutions (Sudeban) authorized the bank to appoint a representative in Caracas. “Promoting and informing Venezuelan residents of the products and services” that the bank “may offer” was one of the justifications of the Venezuelan banking regulator for granting the license contained in Official Gazette 40.970 of August 19, 2016.

At the time when the authorization was given, the United States had not applied economic sanctions against the chavista regime. However, Maduro’s administration was quick to use the services of North International Bank as a correspondent bank for state financial entities, such as Banco del Tesoro or Banco del Desarrollo Social (Bandes), and for the millionaire payments to intermediaries contracted to supply food for the Local Supply and Production Committees (Clap). Antigua is one of the jurisdictions with the highest banking secrecy, according to the index of the NGO Tax Justice Network.

For example, just eleven months after the approval by Sudeban, $425 million of a payment from Nicolas Maduro’s government to Group Grand Limited began passing through a bank account in North International Bank. Group Grand Limited is the company registered in Hong Kong behind which Colombian businessmen Alex Saab Moran and Alvaro Pulido Vargas hid in order to control imports for the Claps with Mexican products, from the very beginning of the state plan devised by Maduro. 

The details of that transaction are in contract CPVX-CJ-CONT-0086-2017 entered into by and between the state-owned Corporacion Venezolana de Comercio Exterior (Corpovex) (Venezuelan Foreign Trade Corporation), responsible for centralizing public imports, and the Hong Kong company. The document shows North International Bank and the Dutch Rabobank as channels of the transaction that would end in the coffers of Group Grand Limited, 50% of which was paid in advance.

The contract also shows that the Colombian duo,  widely favored by Nicolas Maduro with millionaire businesses since 2013, charged $37 for each Clap box, $3 more than for each combo from a previous contract. A year later, in October 2018, the Attorney General’s Office of Mexico reported irregularities, like overbilling or poor quality of the shipments of Group Grand Limited for the Venezuelan government.

At the time of the agreement, signed by Air Force Major General Giuseppe Yoffreda, representing Corpovex, neither Saab nor Pulido had been included on the Ofac’ list of those sanctioned by the U.S. Department of the Treasury, nor had they been accused of money laundering in a South Florida court, events that occurred in mid-2019. Nor had the Italian Guardia Di Finanza frozen their assets, as it did in last year’s November.

However, Armando.info had revealed by then that Colombian businessmen were camouflaging behind Group Grand Limited. A few years earlier, the Ecuadorian Attorney General’s Office accused them of several crimes allegedly committed with company Fondo Global de Construccion. In 2011, the businessmen duo had signed through this same company a multi-million dollar contract with the government of Hugo Chavez to build prefabricated homes in popular areas, which marked the beginning of the golden era of their business with the self-styled Bolivarian Revolution and the process took Alex Saab to the Miraflores palace in one of his few public appearances.

Group Grand Limited’s is not the only financial transaction linked to the Claps that has passed through jurisdictions known for their financial opacity. Saab and Pulido have personally used companies from the United Arab Emirates, while other intermediaries have received millionaire payments in banks in Hong Kong and Switzerland.

Correspondent Bank ⸺ Allied Government

It is possible that the Caracas government’s preference for North International Bank is because its partners are Venezuelan investors. Or perhaps, Saab and Pulido’s experience in the Antigua and Barbuda jurisdiction - which the Colombian tandem is very familiar with - has been more of a factor. Alex Saab even had a passport as the island’s “economic representative,” issued in 2014, when Prime Minister Gaston Browne had only been in office for a few months. Browne had to give public explanations for the issuance of that document, precisely when the investigations against Saab and Pulido were heating up. “All I can say to the people of Antigua and Barbuda is that if Mr. Saab is accused at any time of any wrongdoing, you can rest assured that we will revoke his appointment,” he said to a local radio station in October 2018.

Browne is a close ally of Maduro, but is not clear if this relationship preceded or went along with the conversion of Antigua and Barbuda into a Chavista financial hub. The relationship began within the framework of the Petrocaribe program, whereby Hugo Chavez managed to seduce many of the English-speaking Caribbean countries, which hold a significant number of votes at the OAS and other international forums. Nonetheless, Browne and Antigua and Barbuda stood out to the point that in 2019, they became full members of Alba (Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America), the alliance of Bolivarian regimes also created by Chavez but currently in decline.

There is other evidence of the role of North International Bank in the financial tricks of Maduro’s administration. On December 24, 2017, the state-owned Banco del Tesoro wished a “Merry Christmas" to those it called “our correspondent banks.” The entity of Antigua and Barbuda was among the banks greeted, together with the Russian Gazprobank, Italbank International Inc and the Commonwealth Bank & Trust, domiciled in Dominica, another island in the Caribbean.

Deputy Carlos Paparoni, who has been investigating the business behind the imports for the Claps since 2017 and last year was appointed by the interim government of Juan Guaido as “presidential commissioner against terrorism and organized crime,” has also identified North International Bank as “an intermediary bank” in irregular or illegal financial operations of the Maduro regime, where Bandes (Economic and Social Development Bank of Venezuela) has participated. Until 2016, when Sudeban was approved and after eight years from its creation, the trail of North International Bank in Venezuela was rather discreet.

With a Venezuelan Accent

The first North International Bank representative in Caracas, endorsed by Sudeban, was Fidel Antonio Gomez Barrios, who is not known for his experience in financial institutions, saved for his presence in a company registered in Panama in 2008, called Optivalores Servicios Financieros S.A. Fidel Gomez will not be the only Venezuelan behind North International Bank. Actually, his partners and most of his employees are also Venezuelan.

The current partners of the bank are Jordan Alberto Silva Tugues and Carlos Eduardo Sandoval Arocha, both owners of NIB Asesores de Negocios in Caracas. With that company they filed in 2013 with the Autonomous Service of Intellectual Property (Sapi) the rights of the brand of North International Bank in Venezuela, which were granted to them the following year. Both the bank and the Caracas-based NIB Asesores de Negocios were founded in 2008 and have offices in Torre La Castellana, east of Caracas. Fidel Gomez, Jordan Silva and Carlos Sandoval also worked in Caracas for the firm Econoconsult Consultores Asociados.

Carlos Vicente Croes Hernandez was also a partner of North International Bank between 2015 and 2016. “I have never been a director of the bank, only a shareholder,” Croes affirmed. In his Linkedin profile, he stresses that he has “no administrative, managerial or directive responsibility” when referring to his time at the bank.

The face of North International Bank as chairman of the board is Jordan Silva. He was the one who appeared at the signing of a sponsorship agreement with the Spanish first-division soccer club Atletico de Madrid. “The agreement, effective for four years, aims to offer more and better payment options to our team’s fans in South America and the Caribbean, reinforcing their athletic identity and passion for soccer,” the Spanish team said in a statement, describing North International Bank as “a renowned bank" also based in the Dominican Republic, in addition to Antigua and Barbuda.

Yet, there is no trace of the potential operation of North International Bank in the Dominican Republic, not even on the bank’s website or in its promotional channels. Jordan Silva’s résumé also highlights his experience as president of the state-owned Banco Solidario C.A. from 2006 to 2008, as well as executive director of the Federal District Government from 1995 to 1998. When contacted for this report, Silva asked for the questions in writing, but as of the close of this edition, he had not responded.

Sources linked to the financial world explain that it was from 2014, when Sapi authorized the use of the North International Bank brand in the country, that it began to attract clients with the offer of prepaid debit cards in dollars, at a time when the rigid exchange control implemented by Chavism still limited the possibility of having dollars if traveling abroad. In fact, in addition to the use of the brand, Sapi approved the name “travel card” for the promotion of “prepaid and postpaid" debit and credit cards.

In the press release issued by North International Bank weeks after its alliance with Atletico de Madrid, it was affirmed that “it has issued over one million physical payment instruments in the last decade, from prepaid cards, credit cards, payroll cards to gift cards and other options.”

In 2014, North International Bank was also seen as a sponsor and co-publisher of brochures of Venezuelan visual artists. “For Nibank, it is an honor to contribute to Latin American society as an international sponsor of several social causes, within our commitment to the development of the human being in ethical, social, sporting and cultural aspects,” reads one of those brochures. It was an ambitious presentation for a reality that at the time was still rather diffuse.

Today, however, the bank seems to be expanding. In addition to the funds related to the Clap's intermediaries, the mediation or correspondent activities of Venezuelan state banks, as well as the sponsorship agreement with Atletico de Madrid, the institution is looking for staff for its office in Caracas. In February of this year, the bank published in its social media vacancies for administrators, corporate lawyers and IT means of payment and web development specialists, among other positions. This is another sign that North International Bank is booming since Sudeban authorized its operation in Venezuela in 2016, despite of the extended economic downturn experienced in the country.

With no career path in mining, Adrián Perdomo is, in fact, an old acquaintance of Alex Saab Morán and Álvaro Pulido Vargas, the Colombian entrepreneurs who since 2016 stand out as the main beneficiaries of food imports for the state program of the Local Supply and Production Committee (Clap), linked to Maduro in 2017 by General Prosecutor Luisa Ortega Díaz, dismissed from office by Chavismo. Maybe that was the only reason why Maduro signed on July 20, 2018, the presidential decree that appointed Perdomo as president of Minerven.

The link between Adrián Perdomo and the pair Saab-Pulido is such that on February 21, just a month before being sanctioned by the USA, the president of Minerven was in Bogotá. His trip had nothing to do with the operations of the mining company. In fact, Perdomo was trying to dissociate himself from two Colombian companies related to the never-ending business scheme that the couple of entrepreneurs, also Colombian, developed thanks to their business with Chavismo.

Documents obtained for this report confirm that the participation of Adrián Perdomo in the business structure of the Colombian duo goes back to the activities of Fondo Global de Construcción, a holding company with presence in several countries (Colombia, Peru, Venezuela) and origin in the Mediterranean island of Malta, with which both began in 2011 their career as contractors of the self-styled Bolivarian Revolution.

Adrián Perdomo - about to be 50 - has only been eight months at the head of the state company in charge of exploring, exploiting and processing gold from the Guayana mines in southern Venezuela. But his placement coincides with a boom in metal trade as a mean to replace the increasingly meager oil revenues of the Government of Maduro due to the disaster that the industry has been experiencing for months.

"The Treasury is targeting Minerven and its president for propping up the immediate environment of the corrupt regime of Maduro," Steve Munchin, Secretary of the Treasury, said in a statement on Tuesday. "We will aggressively pursue those involved in the illicit trade of gold that is contributing to this financial, humanitarian and environmental crisis," he warned.

Road to Turkey

Apart from considering them illegal for not being approved by the National Assembly - controlled by the opposition since 2016 - or as a mechanism to evade the financial sanctions imposed by Donald Trump’s administration since August 2017, US authorities suspect that there are corrupt practices behind the increased gold exports. In October 2018, there was a first warning from the North.

"We have seen Turkish companies replace many of the food companies that made incursions into the corruption related to the Clap food boxes program," said Marshall Billingslea, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury. By that time, Venezuela was sending shipments of gold to Turkey of about 21 tons, valued at around 800 million dollars. In exchange, around 31 thousand tons of food and another 120 of medicines, came from Turkey to Venezuela dispatched by a score of suppliers, while Maduro and Recep Tayyip Erdogan strengthened the ties between both nations.

Víctor Cano, Minister of Mining Development, acknowledged to the Reuters agency in July 2018 that the gold shipments were the product of a gold refining "deal" between Turkey and the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV). "It is not smuggling to Turkey," he insisted. It is one of the few statements offered by any Venezuelan official about an exchange that seems out of control and of which the president of Minerven is a key figure.

One of his first decisions was also Turkey-related. On August 31, 2018, just one month after taking office, the creation of a "joint venture" between Minerven and the Turkish Marilyn’s Proje Yatirim, an unknown company connected with the scheme hatched by Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido – his former bosses -, became official. “We are a gold and metal products trading company worldwide (...) Our extensive network of contacts allows us to have wide global coverage," says the website of the Turkish company. It also affirms that they are capable of extracting and processing gold and precious metals, although without detailing where they have developed such works. 

In addition to gold exports from the so-called Orinoco Mining Arc, Maduro has liquidated part of the gold from international reserves. Noor Capital, a financial firm of the United Arab Emirates, which according to sources has also been used for payments to CLAP food importers, confirmed that in January of this year, it bought three tons of that monetary gold. One of the most recent operations reported by opposition parliamentarians is the sale of eight tons that ended up in a refinery in Uganda, which are investigated by the authorities of that country for potential smuggling. The “Cuentas Claras” Digital portal, dedicated to corruption issues in Venezuela, linked Alex Saab to that case. "Sources: Alex Saab would be the owner of the gold seized in Uganda that he received as payment for imports made for the Maduro regime, of which he is the main supplier," posted the portal on his Twitter account, on March 17.

This version has not been proved. The Venezuelan authorities have not spoken on the subject either. However, there is no doubt about the connection of the now sanctioned president of Minerven with the many businesses of Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido.

Old Acquaintances

A first proof of the link between the president of Minerven and Colombian entrepreneurs Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido was revealed by Armando.info in a report published last October. It showed that Adrián Perdomo was a Caracas-based director of Trading Energy and Coal (Trenaco), a Colombian oil company headquartered in Switzerland, controlled in the shadow by Saab. That was just a sign.

On February 21, Adrián Perdomo dissociated himself in Bogotá from Latin American Supply Corporation (Colasum), registered in February 2015, and Aerojet Executive SAS, registered on January 8, 2016, with subsidiaries in Venezuela and the USA. The first, engaged in food marketing, was founded with Carlos Rolando Lizcano Manrique, an entrepreneur born in Cúcuta (Department of Norte de Santander in Colombia, on the border with Venezuela) with double share in the Clap business. On the one hand, he owns the company with which Saab and Pulido control the Clap Stores in Venezuela. He was also behind Group Grand Limited, the Hong Kong company to which the Government granted at least two contracts for almost 800 million dollars for the importation of 21.5 million food combos and another 800 million for the purchase of medicines in India.

In the case of Aerojet Executive, soon after its registration, the shares were held by Héctor Alejandro Valencia Fernández, Venezuelan, and Roswell Jesús Rosales Oberto, Venezuelan and Álvaro Pulido’s pilot. The Mexican authorities that in October 2018 revealed surcharges and poor quality of food exports by Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido for the CLAPs have records of Roswell Oberto and Álvaro Pulido entering that country on private flights.

The positions of general and acting manager of both Colasum and Aerojet Executive were left in the hands of the wives of Adrián Perdomo and Roswell Oberto. No one in these companies answered the interview request. In Venezuela, Aerojet C.A. was created in September 2014, in the state of Aragua, center of the country, and a month later, it was registered in the state of Florida, USA. The company in Miami is already inactive, but in Venezuela, Roswell Oberto, who also did not answer the interview request, is listed as one of the partners, according to the National Registry of Contractors (RNC).

But the relationship of the president of Minerven with Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido goes back to Fondo Global de Construcción, the company with which in 2011, they obtained a contract from the Government of Hugo Chávez for the construction of prefabricated homes. This business was eventually investigated by the Ecuadorian Prosecutor's Office, as it was suspected to be an operation to take advantage of the Unitary System of Regional Compensation (SUCRE), promoted by Chavez and his allies, like the then president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa.

In December 2012, Adrián Perdomo signed a contract with the Peruvian subsidiary of Fondo Global de Construcción for the "provision of professional services" that bound himself to "develop a project and assess the economic feasibility, creation, development and startup of poultry farms." For the company, the agreement was signed by Juvenal Jerónimo Alfaro Márquez, who years later coincided in Trenaco with Adrián Perdomo. According to the agreement, Adrián Perdomo would obtain 100,000 dollars.

Almost a year later, in August 2013, the current president of Minerven acted as attorney-in-fact "with wide administration and decision-making powers" of Vram Holding S.A.S., a company registered in Colombia, for his business with Venezuela's state-owned Suministros Venezolanos Industriales (Suvinca), then attached to the Ministry of Commerce.

The Power of Attorney in the name of Adrián Perdomo was signed by Adriana Martínez Rodríguez, partner of Álvaro Pulido and former acting deputy manager of Fondo Global de Construcción in Colombia, renamed in 2014 as Expel Management S.A.S. Vram Holding and Expel Management share a website, but it is not the only proof of the connection between these companies.

Vram Holding signed a contract with state-owned Suvinca in August 2013, for almost 20 million dollars for materials and supplies for the construction of the "Hugo Chávez" beach sports center in the state of Vargas - the central coast of Venezuela -, entrusted to Fondo Global de Construcción by the State Governor, and the baseball stadium. Two years later, on February 20, 2015, Vram Holding invoiced almost 4.5 million dollars to Suvinca for "aluminum modular bleachers", "TV control and security equipment," "power plant," and an "injection water pump," among other items.

The Superintendency of Corporations is investigating these in Colombia since early last year for the possible crime of "transnational bribery." That agency fined the company with the equivalent of about 50 thousand dollars for not cooperating with information at the time of the inspections.

"One of the reasons argued at that time was the existence of an international operation with a foreign entity, in which a public entity from another country was involved in an economic sector exposed to the risk of corruption, in certain countries. Additionally, based on that operation, the existence of a substantial transfer of resources, supported by a contract that could not be executed, was verified," as detailed in the file of the Superintendency of Corporations, which we have access to for this report.

For now, Adrián Perdomo remains silent. He has been silent since he became President of Minerven. For the workers, his trail remains elusive even now that the Department of the Treasury has pointed a finger at him and for his past businesses with Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido, both under scrutiny.

The analysis, conducted from October 5 to December 14, 2018, covered the 27 canned tuna brands present at that time in the Mexican market. According to the results of the test, 14 brands showed high soy content added. Some presentations had more volume of soy than fish, which startled the Mexican general public. But the finding is not unfamiliar to Venezuelans. Since Nicolás Maduro formalized the plan in March 2016, Mexico has been one of the countries where intermediaries handpicked by the Government buy the products of the food combo, including canned tuna.

One of the most valued brands in the Mexican market, which has reached the homes of the poorest in Venezuela with the so-called Clap boxes, is El Dorado. The presentation of 140 grams of yellowfin tuna in oil has 21% to 44% of soy in "drained solids", while the version in water had an index of 13% to 22% of soy in "drained solids." Both values easily exceed the values registered by the brand in the examination conducted by the same institution in 2015. Back then, the canned tuna in oil showed 9% to 26% of soy, while in water it had 4% to 9% of soy.

"In soy concentrations of 30%, 40%, and even 60%, as we found it, the soy ingredient replaces fish," affirms Guadalupe Velasco Rodríguez, director of the biological-chemical area of the Profeco laboratory. In addition to the deception of consumers that the replacement represents because the label does not specify the soy percentage, there are also nutritional implications for consumers when the final protein contribution of the product is changed.

"For every 100 grams (3.5 oz) -a standard measure- you will have an important amount of protein but never as significant as that of tuna muscle, because tuna has no carbohydrates or other components, while soy does, hence, it does not have so much protein," explains Pablo Hernández, nutritionist and professor at Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV), the main state and autonomous university, after analyzing the results of the Mexican agency. He explains that the vegetable protein is absorbed and digested slower than the animal protein, which "does not harm or affect health," unless the person is allergic to soy.

El Dorado is not the only Mexican brand of canned tuna with high concentrations of soy included in the Clap combos. The Ancla brand tuna in oil contains 10% to 14% of soy in "drained solids." The canned tuna in water ranges between 17% and 26%. Both presentations also showed high concentrations of soy in the analysis that Profeco conducted in 2015, but that did not prevent them from supplying the combos subsidized by the Venezuelan Government.

A third brand called Tuny totaled 1% to 4% of soy for the yellowfin product in water. "It would be justifiable to find one percent of soy, for example, if used with a technological purpose (some producers use soy broth to compact the fish). Our conclusion is that soy is replacing fish," says the director of Profeco.

The Mexican authorities approved since 2017 "certificates of free sale export" to Venezuela for both El Dorado and Tuny, as well as other brands that were not analyzed by Profeco. It seems clear that behind the addition of soy to canned tuna there is an operation to lower costs and increase profitability: The greater the amount of vegetable protein, the lower the cost of the product. This practice of Mexican industrialists, discovered by the authorities, bounces in Venezuelans’ stomachs.

What goes around comes around/ A mouth Close Catches No Flies

Complaints about the quality of the Claps’ food emerged almost from the beginning of the state plan. Indeed, canned tuna and milk powder have been the products most questioned by the beneficiaries of the program with which Maduro affirms to be facing an "economic war" by local businessmen and international factors.

The poor quality of the milk was verified after the Institute of Science and Food Technology of the UCV, at the request of Armando.info, analyzed 14 Mexican brands that were distributed in the Claps from late 2017 to early 2018. The analyzes showed that the companies lied in the labeling and ended up packing a paste high in sodium and carbohydrates, but low in calcium and proteins, far from the requirements of the Venezuelan nutritional standard.

On October 18, 2018, the Attorney General's Office of Mexico revealed that it had detected a "fraudulent scheme" between Venezuelan government intermediaries and Mexican companies, whereby "low quality products" were sold and exported at an "overprice." On that occasion, the Mexican authorities pointed a finger directly to the network hatched by Colombian entrepreneurs Alex Saab Morán and Álvaro Pulido Vargas, main beneficiaries in the mediation behind the Claps.

Profeco's study now confirms what the palate of Venezuelan consumers detected almost immediately, as well as the alerts from sources involved in the sale of products for the Claps. "Venezuelan intermediaries came to Mexico asking for the cheapest tuna on the market, regardless of whether it was at the expense of quality. As to the cheap milk, they were told that the protein would be reduced up to three times, and in the case of canned tuna, it would have more soy than fish. But they only cared to save two to four dollars per box," admits an anonymous Mexican entrepreneur.

Official figures indicate that from 2016 to 2018, 231 million Clap combos have been distributed. Although the plan aimed to produce food, as small cells throughout the country, most of these combos have been imported and many of them were bought in Mexico by intermediaries who finally sold them to the Government of Maduro at 31 to 37 US dollars. "In Mexico, up to 2,000 Clap boxes were brought together per day. How much money could this savings represent? If they saved two dollars per box, it represented 4,000 dollars per day and if they managed to save four dollars per box, that meant 8,000 dollars per day," says the entrepreneur.

In the case of canned tuna, nutritionist Pablo Hernández explains that "soy protein isolate, although slightly more expensive, it is not as expensive as animal protein. So, whether it is whole soy, soy flour or soy protein, it will always less expensive than regular meat."

In January 2017, Group Grand Limited ?the company registered in Hong Kong with which Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido started their participation in the sale of food for the Claps since late 2016? invoiced the canned tuna at $ 6.29 per kilogram. Months later, in September, it charged it at $ 4.22. In that period, it increased the price of each Clap box from 34 to 36.9 dollars. Other intermediaries, like M.I.R Importació I Exportació charged $ 4.71 per kilogram of canned tuna in October 2017. Wellsford Trading Corp and FB Foods, both Panamanians, J&B International Trading, domiciled in Miami, or Mass Joy Industries Limited, also registered in Hong Kong, have been other intermediaries. Each Clap box contains, in the best of cases, up to six cans of tuna, a total of around 800 grams per box. It is one of the 11 products included in the subsidized food combo.

The profit of the intermediaries is in detriment of the quality. There could be other brands of canned tune with high concentrations of soy sold through the Claps. Marhel, La Marina, Mazatún and Capitán Nemo identify on their labels the presence of soy or "vegetable broth," but without specifying the proportion. None of these brands was analyzed by Profeco, as they did not circulate through the marketing channels in the domestic market of Mexico at the time of sample collection. 

In addition, several of these brands offered presentations of flaked or shredded tuna, which multiplies the possibility of finding more soy. "The products were we found more percentages of soy were the flaked and shredded presentations, which are the cheapest," said the director of Profeco's laboratory.

Those versions of flaked or shredded tuna have been the most criticized by Venezuelans. In social media videos and comments about their bad appearance, unpleasant taste or lack of consistency have boomed. "The tuna in the Clap box is always minced because it's not real tuna, just fish waste that they grind to make it look like tuna. When you try it you realize that it tastes more like the sardine but quite unpleasant," wrote a user on February 18.

The May 15, 2017 edition of Diario 2001 newspaper is proof that the complaints go back in time. The cover story on that day was about a family that affirmed that two babies died for eating Clap tuna. "A family of Ocumare del Tuy (State of Miranda) denounces intoxication from eating products from a Clap box bought a day earlier. Intake was lethal for the two youngest kids (11 months and two years old), who presented cerebral edema, according to the autopsy shown by relatives."

Venezuelan officials have avoided commenting on the quality of Clap food, although that was one of the flags used on February 23 to avoid the arrival of "humanitarian aid" promoted by the Venezuelan opposition. Only Maduro admitted in December 2017 that they received complaints on that regard, but said that "corrective measures were taken immediately." However, the complaint by the Attorney General in last year’s October, the finding in May 2018 in the port of Cartagena, Colombia, of 400 tons with Clap products "unfit" for human consumption, or this recent study by Profeco call the words of the president into question. At least no one seems to have noticed that they bought a canned tuna very different from the one sold in the Venezuelan market.

In Venezuela, companies that sell canned tuna do not add soy, at least the main brands. Moreover, most of the presentations are of fish loins, as established by the technical specifications. "The proportion of loin versus crumb should have a minimum of 80/20, that is, 80% loin and 20% crumb," established the quality standard that the Ministry of Food sent to Mexican suppliers, which is based on the Covenin 1412 standard.

"Venezuelan tuna was always of very good quality. The different brands always declared 100% tuna. You ate real tuna. Now, when you do not have the opportunity to know what you are eating, it is one more factor that adds to the already deteriorated diet of Venezuelans," recalls Marianella Herrera, a nutritionist and director of the Venezuelan Health Observatory. She says that in some communities they have visited, consumers of Clap products said that they use "more mayonnaise to cover the taste" of canned tuna "because soy has a completely different flavor."

Beyond the taste, the specialist insists that the vegetable protein is not bad, but you should know "what is the proportion" contained in the product to know exactly how to meet the nutritional requirements "based on the group you want to feed."

So far, that has not been an impediment for Maduro’s Government to allocate millions of dollars for the products that his intermediaries buy to Mexican industrialists.

* This is a work researched and published simultaneously by Armando.Info and the Excélsior of Mexico

Gassan Salama Ibrahim was one of the few international observers in the elections of May 20, 2018, whereby Nicolás Maduro was re-elected president of the Republic in a process most of the Venezuelan opposition and a large part of the international community did not recognize. On the day the National Electoral Council (CNE) accredited him as an "international observer," which today looks like the genesis of the political-institutional crisis in the country, Gassan Salama was already a partner of the Maduro Government in the business of selling food for the state program of the Local Supply and Production Committee (Clap) with his company Lido Internacional S.A.

On March 6, 2018, ship Maersk Wismar arrived at the port of La Guaira, near Caracas, with 766 tons of food in 30 containers shipped by Lido Internacional from the port of Manzanillo, in Panama, as per documents of the National Integrated Customs and Tax Administration Service (Seniat). The products included mayonnaise, rice and corn flour, three of the eleven items usually included in the CLAP combos that the Government distributes in poor areas. On April 23, a month before Gassan Salama appeared in Caracas with his international observer vest, his company sent another 620 tons of food in ship San Alessio, according to the customs authority.

The consignee of both shipments was Corporación Única de Servicios Productivos y Alimentarios (Sole Corporation of Productive and Food Services - Cuspal), attached to the Ministry of Food, though they were contracted by the Venezuelan Foreign Trade Corporation (Corpovex), a holding responsible for centralizing public imports. Although the corresponding contract of this delivery could not be checked, Lido International does appear on a list of Corpovex contractors, which Armando.info had access to, containing the names of several food suppliers of the program that Nicolás Maduro made official in March 2016 in response to what he calls the "economic war" by the national entrepreneurship and international factors.

Gassan Salama's company has also stood out in the information exchanged in the meetings held since last year by officials of financial intelligence units from several countries in the region to investigate possible corrupt practices in the Venezuelan Government's business. Based on this information, between last year’s January and August, Lido Internacional exports to Venezuela amounted to almost 3,500 tons.

On November 17, 2017 alone, Gassan Salama's company received payments from the Government for almost two million euros related to the "acquisition of food combos." In January 2018, there was another draft for 1.8 million euros, according to sources in Corpovex. The supply for the Claps was not the first business of Lido Internacional with Maduro. In October 2018, the authorities paid the Panamanian company another 9.7 million euros as payment for contract 0135, initially signed with Corpovex in 2016 for the sale of raw sugar. "To be honest, I do not have any information about it. I would have to ask the owner, but he is not in the country," say the Lido Internacional offices in Panama when asked about the issue.

A Biased Observer

In the social media accounts of this entrepreneur of Arab origin, born in Colombia and naturalized Panamanian in 2001, there are no signs of his business with Chavismo. On the other hand, there are many messages of support for Hugo Chávez, Adán Chávez (brother of the deceased president), Nicolás Maduro, or Fidel Castro, as well as photos in emblematic places of the Cuban and Bolivarian revolutions, of which he declares himself a fervent defender. There is also evidence of his participation as an international observer in the electoral process of May 20.

"It is a pleasure to be invited to Venezuela as an international observer, especially when I am being invited as a Palestinian for such a significant democratic act," he wrote on Twitter that day. The message is accompanied by a photo where he appears wearing a red polo shirt and the brown CNE vest next to former president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa. He also published a video taken from the platform at the Miraflores Palace, seat of the Government in Caracas, where Nicolás Maduro celebrated his disputed victory.

"Congratulations to the Venezuelan people on their elections. I hope the countries of the region understand that four elections took place within ten months in Venezuela. The people are sovereign and decided," he praised when posting the video on the media. It is not clear if the video was made by Gassan Salama, just a few meters from Maduro and mixed among the ministers and heads of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). However, there is more evidence of his closeness to Chavismo figures. In December 2016, he was honored by the then governor of Táchira – south-western Venezuelan Andes -, José Gregorio Vielma Mora, also a retired Army officer and former head of the tax control agency under the presidency of Hugo Chávez. On the same day that Vielma Mora awarded the "highest order of excellence of the state Táchira" to his wife and valued the members of the State Coral on its fortieth anniversary, he also awarded Gassan Salama the Order of Merit of Work.

"In recognition of his effort and dedication, and his outstanding professional, labor, trade, business, academic, cultural and social activities focused on the service and benefit of the public and private administration, the municipality, and also the State of Táchira and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela,", states the award. There is hardly any evidence of his business activity in the Venezuelan registers. It is a company with the same name of the company used to sell food for Claps, registered in Caracas in 2005. It only has two employees and, according to the National Register of Contractors (RNC), there is no evidence that it has signed agreements with the State or processed preferential currencies in the extinct Currency Administration Commission (Cadivi). The office is in a small building in Las Mercedes, a commercial area east of the Venezuelan capital, where no one answers the doorbell.

Still, the recognition by Vielma Mora, who in his youth participated in the coup attempt of 1992 led by Hugo Chávez and until months ago was a minister of Nicolás Maduro, does not seem unplanned. Vielma Mora was a key player in the birth of the Clap as a massive program. In late 2016, Cobiserta, a company attached to the state government of Táchira, signed a first contract with Group Grand Limited, a company registered in Hong Kong and managed by Colombian entrepreneurs Alex Saab Morán and Álvaro Pulido Vargas, for the purchase of ten million Clap combos. In the end, the duo of the Colombian entrepreneurs, now investigated in countries like Colombia and Mexico, became the main importer for the state program, being awarded at least two contracts for nearly 800 million dollars.

That was the beginning of a program that was planned to produce food locally, as small partisan cells, but led to massive imports through intermediaries handpicked by the Government. Until 2017, they bought the food combos mainly in Mexico and then resold them to Venezuela at prices ranging from 34 to 39 dollars for each Clap box. But since last year, companies from Turkey began to gain ground through these intermediaries, while the authorities of Caracas narrowed their political and commercial relationship with the regime of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has become one of their main global allies. Even Lido Internacional has purchased food from Mexican and Turkish manufacturers, according to panjiva.com, a database specialized in international trade.

The few official figures indicate that the Clap is a business that has continued to grow. In 2018, the Government distributed 114 million Clap boxes, in addition to the 91 million distributed in 2017, which would be equal to spending 6,000 to 8,000 million dollars in just two years. "114 million Clap combos were distributed nationwide, groceries at your door. The slogan should be ‘The Clap arrived!’ The revolution brings the groceries right to your door!" said Maduro recently.

Now it is known that Lido Internacional, the company of Gassan Salama, had a portion of that juicy pie. His company, like FB Foods LLC and Wellsford Trading Corp, two other Panamanian Clap suppliers, escaped the commercial veto imposed by the Venezuelan Government in last year’s April against almost one hundred companies of the isthmus, after Panamanian President Juan Carlos Varela sanctioned 55 Venezuelan officials. "Back in 2016, Panama promoted the sale of food to the sister nation of the Republic of Venezuela. Now, strangely, you want to discredit the food supply that Panamanian companies are developing," Salama criticized through a tweet posted on July 14, 2018, with a photo where former minister Miguel Pérez Abad and former president of Corpovex Giuseppe Yoffreda agreed with Panamanian authorities to purchase food for the Clap.

The Treasure Hunter

While Gassan Salama is virtually unknown to the general public in Venezuela, that is not the case in Panama. For years, he has moved between politics and the business world. After being president of the Chamber of Commerce, Agriculture and Industry of Colon - the Caribbean port of Panama that hosts a prosperous duty-free zone - from 2000 to 2002, he became governor of that province in 2003. "As former Governor of the province of Colon, Panama, and as son of the Palestinian Revolution, I reiterate our deepest affection to you, Commander Fidel, and the Cuban people," Salama wrote in 2004 on the Granma, the official Cuban newspaper.

Besides Lido Internacional, Gassan Salama is related to eight additional companies, almost all registered in Colon. The "Palestinian cause" is another of its banners and it powers a number of organizations that promote Palestinian ties with Latin America. In addition to Venezuela, he has taken his business to Cuba and Bolivia. "His links with these countries are as political as they are commercial," explain Panamanian sources.

His role as an entrepreneur does not escape controversy. Gassan Salama is related to Investigaciones Marinas del Istmo (IMDI), created 19 years ago in the province of Colon and accused of plundering the wreckage of the galleon San José, a Spanish ship sunk in 1631 in the Gulf of Panama. Between 2013 and 2014, the company rescued a treasure of silver coins that were eventually confiscated by the National Customs Service. On July 5, 2012, La Prensa newspaper referred to the work of IMDI ??as "treasure hunters without control" and warned that "IMDI may have taken gold, silver or objects from ships that were wrecked there (waters near Contadora), without declaring them and thus the National Institute of Culture (Inac) could not determine if they were to be preserved in museums, in case they have historical value." That release assured that Gassan Salama, as vice president of IMDI, ??stated that "to date, there is no rescue to report."

Years later, a Unesco report of December 7, 2015 indicated IMDI’s responsibility?? in the case of San José. According to the review made by La Prensa newspaper on that report, the actions of the company were a "simple operation of extraction of objects masked in an allegedly archaeological project" and that "the activities carried out by IMDI ??could have affected more than a sunken wreck in the area of ??the Pearl archipelago."

In the third the contentious-administrative court of the Panamanian Supreme Court of Justice are two files related to the work of IMDI. So far that does not seem to have been an obstacle for Gassan Salama to continue his business in Panama and abroad. On June 21, 2018, just a month after he participated as an international observer in the Venezuelan elections, the Panamanian entrepreneur met with the Minister for Regional Integration Policies of the Dominican Republic, as one of the representatives of the construction company China State Construction Engineering Corporation Ltd (Cscec) to assess potential investments in the Caribbean country. "The group was made up of Zhihe Zhang, Sui Man, Kevin Zhao, Zaid Yaafar and Gassan Salama," reported the presidential bulletin of the Dominican Republic.

The search for new businesses does not prevent him from paying close attention to the political-institutional crisis that exists in Venezuela. On January 25, two days after the Venezuelan opposition proclaimed Juan Guaidó - president of the National Assembly with an opposition
majority -, as the interim president of the Republic, Gassan Salama expressed his criticism on Twitter. "Democracies are for those who understand it, not for those who lose elections and continue plotting coups. Long live democracy and long live Venezuela. Only the Venezuelan people will resolve their differences internally."

At that time, the official statement of the Mexican agency only referred to the cast of characters that move around the scheme of import intermediation of Colombian entrepreneurs Alex Nain Saab Morán and Álvaro Pulido Vargas. But did not made an allusion to the suppliers, a trio of business groups in Mexico that hold in their few hands a billion-dollar business.

Jorge and Elías Landsmanas Dymensztejn, owners of Corporativo Kosmos and its subsidiaries Productos Serel and La Cosmopolitana; Jorge Carlos Fernández Francés of El Sardinero; and Aristóteles Vaca Pérez, owner of Almacenes Vaca and Rice & Beans, are the names of those who supply a fundamental portion of the supplies that arrive in Venezuela packed as Clap boxes or bags. They are joined by Grupo Brandon, a dummy company that in 2018 has monopolized the offer of powdered milk for the Venezuelan social program.

Some of these companies have already appeared on the Mexican press as protagonists of public incidents. For instance, La Cosmopolitana was responsible for distributing Salmonella-contaminated food in a jail called Puente Grande in 2014, which intoxicated 450 inmates. El Sardinero was fined for falsifying the address in a public tender, while Almacenes Vaca holds around 600 contracts by direct award with the Government of Enrique Peña Nieto, outgoing president of Mexico.

In the statement of October 18, the authorities preferred to omit the participation of these companies for which the government plan formalized by Nicolás Maduro on March 12, 2016 became a millionaire opportunity. Figures from the Ministry of Economy of Mexico indicate that from January 2017 to August 2018 alone, exports of the 11 products containing Clap boxes totaled 850 million dollars. A significant increase if taking into account that months before the creation of the state plan, the trade between both countries was minimum and there were just sporadic exports of vegetable oil, corn flour and lentils.

Deep-Sea Fishing

As to El Sardinero, self-defined as a "leading company in food services", business started soon. In early 2017, it dispatched thousands of Clap combos for Cobiserta, a company attached to the Táchira State Government, with which Group Grand Limited signed in late 2016 a contract to supply the program of the Venezuelan Government. At the time of the agreement between Group Grand Limited - the holding registered in Hong Kong by Saab and Pulido - and the State Government of Táchira, in western Venezuela, the governor of the State was José Gregorio Vielma Mora, a captain of the army of Hugo Chavez's batch, former director of the national tax agency and then Minister of Foreign Trade of Nicolás Maduro for a few months.

On October 18, the assistant attorney general of Mexico pointed at the network created around Group Grand Limited, with which the duo of Colombian entrepreneurs organized all their import business. "The presence of several operators was detected, like Alex X, apparently related to Government authorities of that country, as well as Álvaro X, Emmanuel X, Santiago X and Andrés X, who, with the purpose of obtaining the food products to be supplied to the Venezuelan Government, resort to other companies in different countries, including Mexico." He was referring to Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido, but also to representatives of Group Grand Limited in Mexico, Santiago Uzcátegui Pinto, Andrés Eduardo León Rodríguez and Emmanuel Enrique Rubio González, son of Álvaro Pulido, who changed his name shortly after 2000, originally Germán Rubio. The General Prosecutor, Luisa Ortega Díaz, dismissed by Nicolás Maduro, denounced in last year’s August that the Venezuelan president was behind Group Grand Limited.

A recent bill, dated July 7, 2018, reveals that El Sardinero maintains food supplies for the Claps in partnership with Colombian entrepreneurs, although no longer through Group Grand Limited. The company now invoices the goods to Asasi Food FZC, a company registered in the United Arab Emirates, which has replaced Group Grand Limited in the Saab-Pulido network. The customs figures also confirm that the business of El Sardinero is running. In the first half of this year, it sent almost 100,000 tons of food to Venezuela, which makes it the Mexican company the largest exporter of products to the South American country.

In 2015, the name of Jorge Carlos Fernández Francés, owner of El Sardinero, was news when it was discovered that, in order to evade taxes, he put Mexico City license plates on to a Ferrari 458 that he used to drive around Paris, Barcelona and Rome at least four years before. The registration number 415-SYL used by his sports car actually belonged to a 2003 Golf, according to car records of the government of Mexico City, and it was in the name of El Sardinero. The company has also had its clashes with the law. On December 22, 2014, the Public Service sanctioned it with a ban of just under two and a half years to enter into contracts with federal agencies and entities, and a fine of 672,000 pesos (around $ 34,000), for falsifying the address in a public tender.

Captive Markets

It is not the only Mexican company linked to the Clap business, engaged in irregularities. The Landsmanas Dymensztejn family, owner of La Cosmopolitana and Productos Serel, was penalized in July 2014 by health authorities of the Government of Jalisco, province of western Mexico, after verifying that they sold food with Salmonella in the Puente Grande prison. It is the same conglomerate that sells Kosland milk powder, manufactured by Serel Products, which arrives in Venezuela in the Clap combos. The brand was one of the worst in nutritional terms after the physical-chemical analysis conducted by the Institute of Food Science and Technology of Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV) practiced on several Mexican milks at the request of Armando.info. The product showed excess carbohydrates and sodium, but low calcium levels, to the point that children had to consume 24.8 glasses to cover their daily calcium supply instead of the 1.8 glasses that are normally required. Clap combos have also contained lentils, beans and sugar from the same Kosland brand of Serel Products.

The company was sanctioned because of what happened in the Puente Grande prison. Although the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) continues receiving complaints from inmates' families about "poor-quality and unhygienic food" from La Cosmopolitana, the millionaire contracts to provide food to several Mexican prisons have not ceased and it has just obtained a new one for 143 million Mexican pesos (just over 7.1 million dollars) to offer food services to the inmates of the Centers for Social Reintegration and Adolescents of the State of Baja California, northwest from Mexico. According to Contrabook, La Cosmopolitana accrues 4,623 million pesos (around 230 million dollars) for public contracts in Mexico.

Customs reports, however, seem to indicate that this year the participation of La Cosmopolitana and Productos Serel in food shipments to Venezuela has dropped. In the first half of year, shipments total around 150 tons, well below El Sardinero or Grupo Brandon, a dummy company that in 2018 has monopolized the sale of milk powder for Claps, one of the products from which Government intermediaries get more financial gain.

The food combos distributed by Maduro’s Government have included several powdered milk brands of Grupo Brandon, which are unknown in the Mexican market and of dubious quality. Incorporated in 2004, Brandon changed ownership in April 2017, shortly before starting its exports to Venezuela. Since then, the company address on the packaging of the product has changed.

An invoice of July 18, 2018 allows establishing the connection with the network of Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido. Like El Sardinero, Grupo Brandon billed Asasi Food FZC, the company registered in the United Arab Emirates, the goods that would eventually be received in Venezuela by Corporación Única de Servicios Productivos y Alimentarios (Sole Corporation of Productive and Food Services -Cuspal), attached to the Ministry of Food.

The document shows that Grupo Brandon sold the kilo of milk from brands like Vilec, Santa Paula and Suprema to Asasi Food FZC, at $ 2.20.

Although the product price billed by the intermediaries to the Government of Maduro was not verified for this report, in 2017,  Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido, through Group Grand Limited, first charged the kilo of Mexican milk powder at 4.75 dollars to the Government of the State of Táchira, and months later, charged it at almost 7 dollars to Cuspal, as part of the two contracts reached with the Venezuelan authorities. Both prices double and more than triplicate, respectively, the price set by Brandon for the product put in this year’s July.

Customs information reveals that in the first half of year, Grupo Brandon exported almost 30,000 tons to Venezuela, barely behind El Sardinero and Rice & Beans, the other company that is winning big time in Mexico with the Venezuelan government program.

Entrepreneur Aristóteles Vaca Pérez, originally from the state of Guanajuato in central Mexico, is the man behind Rice & Beans and Almacenes Vaca. This last one allowed him to stood out as one of the entrepreneurs preferred by Enrique Peña Nieto. Not in vain, in this six-year period to be closed, he obtained about 600 contracts by direct award and through Diconsa, the largest social network of grocery stores in Mexico, responsible for ensuring the distribution of food to the most financially vulnerable population.

Rice & Beans was the vehicle through which the tycoon reached the Clap business. From this year’s January and June alone, the company placed almost 75,000 tons of food in Venezuelan ports. As with El Sardinero and Grupo Brandon, exports are made through the network of Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido. For example, on July 17, 2018, Rice & Beans sold $ 220,104 in food to Mulberry Proje Yatirim, a Turkish company that rounds off the intermediation scheme designed by the Colombian business duo.

Mulberry Proje Yatirim, together with Asasi Food FZC, replaced Group Grand Limited. On April 6, 2018, Group Grand Limited requested by letter to the Venezuelan Foreign Trade Corporation (Corpovex) - a body that centralizes Venezuelan public imports - the "assignment of financial rights corresponding to contract CPVX-CJ-CONT-0086- 2017" in favor of Mulberry Proje Yatirim. That agreement alone required the supply of 11.5 million Clap combos to the Venezuelan Government.

Even if the authorities did not refer to the Mexican companies in the announcements made on October 18, it is clear that the Clap boxes has also been a millionaire business for entrepreneurs in that country, and though it may be about to die out, the other announcement made by the Mexican assistant attorney general deserves acknowledgement, "The accused undertake not to carry out, by themselves or through an intermediary, any business transaction with the Government of Venezuela or third parties that operate or are related to the shipping of Clap to Venezuela."

The program, initially conceived as part of the communal economy system, ended up as a social control mechanism through the more or less consistent distribution of food packages. It also became a juicy opportunity for private importers linked to the government of Nicolás Maduro, who created program in 2016 as his final answer to the alleged Economic War, which based on his story, was led against him by the United States of America and the Venezuelan bourgeoisie.

Although the business arose prior to the sanctions imposed by USA, Canada, Switzerland and the European Union, the intermediaries chosen by the Government have been working in recent months to avoid the financial and logistics barriers that these measures entail. What seems to remain unchanged is the model of maximizing profits at the expense of consumers' health, mostly of the poorest sectors. The product supplied as milk powder in the Clap combos is a paste of zero nutritional values that does not deserve to be called milk.  

That was proved by a report published in February 2018 by Armando.Info based on the physical-chemical study conducted by the Institute of Food Science and Technology of Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV), at the request of the website, to eight brands of powdered milk distributed through the state plan in the second half of last year.

Now, eight months later, Armando.Info commissioned another physical-chemical analysis to the same research center. This time, the samples of six milk presentations were taken, all Mexican, which were the most common in the Clap combos distributed so far this year by the Government, namely, Lacto Más, Chimax, Santa Paula, Vitalac, Vilec and Vaca Milk.

None of them was analyzed in the previous study, but the results confirm the trends found at that time. The Mexican powdered milk of the Claps is a substance of variable composition that is still far from meeting the values recommended by the National Institute of Nutrition (INN) in the Table of Food Composition and in the Venezuelan Covenin 1481 standard on milk powdered.

Fraud and Malnutrition

There is hardly an improvement in the protein levels of the milk analyzed 2018 over the sample analysis of 2017. The improvement, which is insignificant and does not meet the required standards, looks even poorer if it is considered that it had to meet a requirement from the client, the Venezuelan State.

In February 2018, just two days after Armando.Info published the results of the first analysis conducted by UCV researchers, the Venezuelan Foreign Trade Corporation (Corpovex), responsible for centralizing public imports in Venezuela, sent a communication to the Mexican suppliers, requiring them to "mandatorily submit to the verification company and Corpovex the Sanitary Registry and the Certificate of Free Consumption in the country of origin of all shipped food corresponding to products” for the Claps, “either as combos or loose cargo."

According to the new results of the physical-chemical analysis by UCV, four of the analyzed brands contain protein parts close to the standard value of 29 grams per 100 grams (1 oz x 3.5 oz). In fact, the package of the Chimax, Vilec, Vitalac and Santa Paula brands claim to contain 29 grams of protein, which is not entirely true, as their protein contributions range between 25.32 and 27.8 grams (0.9 – 1 oz). Lacto Más, on the other hand, is scandalously below the standard ?3.47 grams of protein per 100 grams
(0.12 oz x 3.5 oz), not even a fifth of the amount set in the Venezuelan nutritional regulations.

The actual performance of the other components of the different brands remains meager and, worst of all, covered up by deception.

For example, the packages of Lacto Más, Chimax, Santa Paula and Vitalac claim having 900 milligrams of calcium per 100 grams (0.032 oz x 3.5 oz) of product. But the physical-chemical analysis made it clear that in fact, calcium ranges between 179.63 milligrams (0.006 oz) -Lacto Más- and 527 milligrams
(0.018 oz) -Santa Paula-, which is significantly below the 949 milligrams (0.033 oz) of calcium required for whole milk powder under the Venezuelan nutritional standard. Vilec, identified as semi-skimmed, has 528 milligrams of calcium per 100 grams (0.019 oz x 3.5 oz), less than half of the 1,290 milligrams
(0.046 oz) set by the regulations for skimmed milk powder.

The difference entails that a child between two and four years of age should take more glasses of the product to meet the minimum daily requirement of calcium with milk alone. Children would need to drink 3.2 glasses of Vilec and Santa Paula milk brands and 9.3 glasses of Lacto Más, instead of the 1.8 glasses that would be enough if it were a standard whole milk. While adults would need 6.3 glasses of Santa Paula milk and up to 18.6 glasses of Lacto Más to meet their daily demand of calcium.

Pablo Hernández, professor of Human Nutrition at UCV, warns that the lack of this element can cause serious decalcifications in the future.

In addition to the low calcium detected, again, there is excess carbohydrates and sodium. In Lacto Más alone, the carbohydrate content exceeds by 215.8% what is established by the standards and, yet worse, the actual value almost doubles the one reported by the manufacturer on the label.

Sodium levels are also exorbitant. Chimax has 1,856 milligrams (0.065 oz), five times the 370.8 milligrams per 100 grams (0.013 oz x 3.5 oz) of product established in the standard. In the Santa Paula brand, the result of 1,632 milligrams (0.057 oz) quadruples the maximum amount indicated by the National Institute of Nutrition. These doses almost exceed the daily sodium intake recommended by the World Health Organization, set at less than two grams (0.070 oz).

Complaints of consumers against some of these brands are common on social media. "The Lacto Más milk that comes in the Clap is terrible. I spent two days with an acute heartburn after consuming it. I regret that Mexico is sending us this terrible milk. The corrupt people from here and there will be accountable to God for poisoning the children of Venezuela with that milk," user @joseprool tweeted on July 2.

Maritza Landaeta, research coordinator of the Bengoa Foundation and a doctor specialized in Food and Nutrition Planning, warns of the risks of excess carbohydrates among traditional consumers of milk powder in the Venezuelan homes. "This causes the child to present flatulence, a bloated stomach, pain and even vomiting and diarrhea. The same happens with die elder."

She also stresses that in a context of malnutrition, as reflected in the most recent bulletins by Cáritas Venezuela, and a greater dependence on the Clap box, these products aggravate the health situation of Venezuelans.

"Children who arrive with severe kwashiorkor or edematous malnutrition (swollen by lack of protein), or marasmatic malnutrition (skin attached to the bones for lack of calories), have among their history the ingestion of these products, which aggravate the situation because somehow they work as if the child acquired an infection, and cause diarrhea, vomiting, stomach ache, and the child rejects food and begins that vicious circle of infection and malnutrition."

Last May, the president of the National Assembly’s comptroller's office commission, Freddy Superlano, filed a complaint with the Mexican Attorney General's Office for the poor quality of the milk powder that the country exports for the Claps, but it essentially served no purpose.

Fifth and Only

One of the brands subjected to analysis ?Vaca Milk, packaged by the Mexican company B-Eminent Inc., avoids referring to its product as milk, and identify it on its packaging as a dairy product. The euphemism at least offers consumers the chance to know that it is not milk and more freedom for traders since the Venezuelan law does not provide for specific values for this type of product that may be breached. This does not mean that it is healthy though. The UCV study found that its carbohydrate content almost doubles that required for whole milk and its calcium level is the lowest of the six samples analyzed.

Vaca Milk was the product shown by the Minister of Food, Luis Alberto Medina, during a TV broadcast last June while inspecting a Clap distribution center. "We are in another center for Clap food packaging, verifying the quality of the product," he explained.

Furthermore, Vaca Milk is the only one that does not appear as produced by the same provider of the other five brands, which is somewhat surprising when considering the variety of formulas and content proportions checked about them.

"One would expect the manufacturer to have a standard formula for their product. If the products are different, you must change the labeling (...) They certainly do not produce a quality product nor do they comply with Venezuelan regulations. And it's definitely not milk," says nutritionist Pablo Hernández.

"We may not be in the presence of a milk powder factory but just a filler or packer that only buys second-class milk powder. They are not even dehydrating milk," says Rodrigo Agudo, director of the Venezuelan Institute of Milk and Meat (Invelecar).

That company, which both experts make a spoken portrait of, is known as Grupo Brandon. With their variants in quality, name and content - all equally mediocre though - the Lacto Más, Chimax, Santa Paula, Vitalac and Vilec brands belong to Grupo Brandon.

Grupo Brandon has been omnipresent in the Clap boxes sold this year. It is practically unknown in business circles in Mexico, a country with no tradition of exporting dairy products, unlike the United States of America, Holland, Argentina or New Zealand. Based on the evidence, his motto should be "Many brands and no quality."

In 2018, Grupo Brandon became the main supplier of the product for the Clap program. Their packages, which always warn that the milk is aimed "solely for distribution in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela," show two addresses, and another one registered in some manifests, that lead to the state of Nuevo León, north of Mexico. In all cases, they lead to offices that have nothing to do with milk production.

That does not prevent the company from affirming on its website, "We are a 100-percent Mexican company with fifteen years of experience in the market, selling foodstuffs, mainly dairy products." The website was created last year, shortly after changing owners and right before their items began to be included in the government combos.

There are no references to the brands that it sells, but the company maintains that its mission is to offer "top-quality products at the best possible price."

The incorporation papers show that Grupo Brandon was incorporated in November 2004 and belonged to the Marcos Corella family for thirteen years. On April 5, 2017, it passed into the hands of Javier Eduardo Rodríguez de La Fuente, of barely 21 years old, and Mario Alberto Valdez Díaz, a 19-year-old teenager. Shortly after, the exports of milk to Venezuela began. Last December, Raymundo Almaguer Macías was appointed as agent of the company and the Clap business was already on track at full speed.

Christian Marcos Corella, of the family that originally controlled the company, did not answer the interview request for this report.

In the Deputy Secretariat for Health Regulation and Promotion, the agency in charge of granting the free sale certificates for the export of milk in the state of Nuevo León, are in the dark about Brandon's operations and cannot find answers to explain the increasing volume of their exports to Venezuela.

The bonanza, in which Grupo Brandon participates, is expressed in numbers. According to figures from the Ministry of Economy of Mexico, in March 2018 alone, two months before the questioned re-election of Nicolás Maduro as president of Venezuela, Mexico exported 56 million kilograms of milk powder to the South American country, practically the same volume dispatched in total in 2017.

The Federal Attorney's Office of Consumer (Profeco) does not seem to know Grupo Brandon either. A study published last April on the quality of 23 brands of milk and dairy products sold in Mexico, does not include any of those sent to Venezuela or even one manufactured for that market by the company that has ended up monopolizing powdered milk shipments for the CLAPs.

The Usual Acquaintances

Those who do have a relationship with Grupo Brandon are Colombian entrepreneurs Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido. Some of the companies that they control in the shade and with which they manage a good part of the food imports for the Claps are precisely those that have bought thousands of kilos of milk powder to the ghostly Mexican company and then resell it to the Venezuelan Government.   

The Santa Paula brand was imported by Salva Foods 2015, the Venezuelan company that owns the "CLAP Stores" franchise that do business in the premises of the extinct state network known as Abastos Bicentenario. Behind this is the Colombian entrepreneur Carlos Rolando Lizcano Manrique, related to Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido through Group Grand Limited, the Hong Kong-registered company that in 2017 signed at least two millionaire contracts with Maduro’s Government to provide food for the Claps.

Both the Santa Paula packages and the Importgenius records, a database specialized in international trade, reveal purchases of Salva Foods 2015 to Grupo Brandon. It is an incomprehensible operation for entrepreneurs of the Venezuelan food industry, since the owner of the CLAP Stores does not appear in any forex acquisition list to be able to import merchandise.

Neither Carlos Lizcano, nor the general manager of Salva Foods 2015, Betsy Desirée Mata Pereda, answered the interview requests for this report. Neither the national coordinator of the Clap, Freddy Bernal nor the office of the Ministry of Food offered any version.

Asasi Food FZC, registered in the United Arab Emirates and related to the business structure of the binomial of Alex Saab and Álvaro Pulido, also bought tons of milk powder to Grupo Brandon from late 2017 to early 2018. Asasi Food FZC is one of the companies used by Colombian entrepreneurs to replace Group Grand Limited, reported in August 2017 by as being directly related to Nicolás Maduro.

Mexican financial authorities have detected flows of hundreds of millions of dollars behind that plot: From Group Grand Limited to Mexican suppliers, and between these and Grupo Brandon and Asasi Food FZC. Apart from Mexico, this scheme is investigated by US, Colombian and Panamanian authorities.

No documents prove the selling price of powdered milk in 2018 were obtained, but in 2017, that was one of the products that increased the profits of the intermediaries. Group Grand Limited, for example, charged the Venezuelan government $ 4.75 per kilo in last year’s January, and in September, the price amounted to almost seven dollars per kilo. Other intermediaries, like M.I.R Importació I Exportació and Wellsford Trading Corp billed the kilo of powdered milk at nearly five dollars.

Statistics from the Mexican Department of Commerce indicate that from January to July 2018, almost 82 million kilos worth 70.3 million dollars were exported to Venezuela, i.e. $ 0.85 per kilo, a little more than the $ 0.5 per kilo reported in 2017. It is a sign that the business is on the rise and that intermediaries are still coming away with the lion’s share.

* This is a work researched and published simultaneously by Armando.info and the Excélsior of Mexico.