![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/PP-29.jpg\")
However, \r\nthe Pdval case report would be his end. According to this document, PDVSA used \r\nuntil mid-2008 over 2 billion dollars to buy one million tons of food. The \r\nreport prepared by Villanueva Rojas\u2019 team revealed that only 25% of what was \r\npurchased arrived in the country, and only 15% of that total was distributed. In \r\naddition, it reported at least 180 million dollars in surcharges for not \r\nconsidering the best offers, acquiring damaged products and sometimes a \r\nsurcharge of nearly 100%. On the other hand, six out of the 10 contracted \r\nsuppliers were intermediaries. All this happened in the context of a food \r\nshortage emergency.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\ndisclosure of that document issued in 2009 by the team of Villanueva\u2014who did not \r\nhesitate to introduce himself as the executive who had the control of all \r\nPdvsa's credit and debit accounts\u2014was known in mid-2010, when the finding of \r\nnearly 100 thousand tons of decomposed food that the state oil company had \r\nbought from companies in China, USA, Brazil and Argentina, was a scandal that \r\nled to the arrest of three company officials in charge of trading these \r\ngoods.<\/p>\n\n\n
Modus Operandi<\/h2>\n\n\n
Upon \r\nreviewing the emails of Mossack Fonseca about the former PDVSA auditor, the \r\nefforts of the law firm to facilitate the operations with the figureheads of \r\nPolitically Exposed Persons (PEP) are evident. Those actions, which border on \r\nillegality, violate international controls against the laundering of money from \r\nactivities like drug trafficking and corruption.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\nfirst step in this story takes place in Luxembourg, the Grand Duchy surrounded \r\nby Belgium, Germany and France. On March 20, 2009, a Mossack Fonseca \r\nrepresentative requested to include a list of 15 companies in the Panama \r\nregistry. He even says that if one is not available, that is, if the name is \r\nalready in use by another company, \"simply add an additional word\" to create a \r\nnew name.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
Among \r\nthe 15 companies is Blue Sea Enterprises, registered in Panama on March 23, with \r\na capital of 10 thousand US dollars. Its directors would then be Mossack Fonseca \r\nemployees, who lend their name to the proceeding before the commercial \r\nregistry.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
But \r\nthis shell company, which had no physical place of business, employees or \r\nmerchandise in production or exhibition, is sold almost two months after, on May \r\n5 of the same year. Although the leaked documents do not indicate who the buyer \r\nis and for what purpose he acquires it, on the same day, the directors of \r\nMossack Fonseca are informed of the due diligence procedures carried out to \r\ndetermine whether Jes\u00fas Manuel Villanueva Rojas was a politically exposed \r\nperson.<\/p>\n\n\n At \r\nthe Luxembourg branch of Mossack Fonseca, they had already issued a power of \r\nattorney to manage the company, and waited for the result of the search. As the \r\nVenezuelan lawyer Alejandro Rebolledo explains, it is a formality with which \r\nbanks and financial advisory companies comply to avoid money laundering crimes. \r\nOn May 6, 2009, one day after the sale, an employee of the law firm explained in \r\nan email how they would proceed after agreeing the sale of the company, \"The \r\ninstructions to update the company's profile are sent with the power of attorney \r\nissued by the Luxembourg office. With this information, the officers investigate \r\nthe agent and update the system if the person has no history that could affect \r\nus.\" Not in all cases an alert is receive, but it was received in the case of \r\nVillanueva Rojas.<\/p>\n\n\n The \r\nleaked emails demonstrate the internal debate generated in Mossack Fonseca due \r\nto the position of Villanueva Rojas in PDVSA. Although the first search rules \r\nout that by May 2009 he would be still a director of the oil company, in a later \r\nanalysis, in July of the same year, he is classified as a director, and they \r\nexplain that Blue Sea Enterprises will be used as an investment vehicle. They \r\nalso detail, according to the information received from Luxembourg, that the \r\nclient's funds come from another Swiss bank and would be the proceeds from \r\n\"savings accumulated by the client during his long professional \r\nactivity\".<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n However, \r\na senior executive of the firm said on July 10, \"In my opinion, it is very \r\nlikely that a scandal arises at some point, particularly because they believe \r\nthey are untouchable and are doing things their way.\" She said regarding the \r\nbehavior of the officials in Venezuela.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n So \r\nit was not Ram\u00f3n Fonseca only, but Jurgen Mossack as well, the other founding \r\npartner of the law firm, who in two emails of one line each consecutively said, \r\nsupporting his partner, \"Right, we cannot have him as a client\". And then added, \r\n\"In addition, they and the bank (the financial entity that participated in the \r\noperation is never identified) are helping the communist \r\ncause.\"<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n After \r\nthose last words the sentence was issued. On July 22, they reported that \"The \r\npartners have decided not to grant Mr. Villanueva the power of attorney, given \r\nthat he is a key person in Pdvsa as the current Director\/Comptroller\/Auditor of \r\nthat entity (...) There is a high risk in doing business with this person, \r\nbecause he has direct access to the public treasury and the origin of his funds \r\nmay be questioned at any given time, so the odds of a scandal are higher. The \r\npartners have also suggested contacting the bank (its client) directly and avoid \r\nthat they too are affected by this situation.\"<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n From \r\nLuxembourg, Villanueva's advisor dismissed the arguments sent by the office. \"My \r\nclient for this company is a bank in Switzerland. They know about Mr. Villanueva \r\nand his background. However, they accepted him as a client, since they have used \r\nseveral reliable sources (not only World Check) to verify the origin of the \r\nfunds deposited in the bank account, and they are absolutely certain that the \r\nmoney comes from clean business. \"<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n Communications \r\nceased until February 2010. Before, Villanueva's representative unsuccessfully \r\nrequested them to reconsider the decision. On the first day of the second month \r\nof the year, the adviser sent an email from Luxembourg to Mossack Fonseca. This \r\ntime, he asked to take up the case of company Blue Sea Enterprises and suggested \r\nthat the daughter of Villanueva, Anny Josefina Villanueva Silva, could be the \r\nholder of the power of attorney.<\/p>\n\n\n Anny \r\nJosefina Villanueva Silva, according to the database of the Social Security of \r\nVenezuela, worked at Baker Qu\u00edmica de Venezuela until 2008. Her life takes place \r\nbetween Cuman\u00e1, in the east of the country, and Caracas, the capital of \r\nVenezuela. When contacted by telephone for this report, she acknowledged being \r\nthe daughter of the former Pdvsa director, but did not want to give information \r\non her father's whereabouts or telephone number to locate him. \"He is not here,\" \r\nshe said before laughing and shut up when asked if the former Pdvsa auditor is \r\nin Houston with his second wife.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n Villanueva \r\nRojas is a public accountant graduated from Universidad Central de Venezuela, \r\nwith a postgraduate degree in Hydrocarbon Economics from the same university, \r\nwith international certifications as an internal auditor and fraud examiner, \r\naccording to the profile written by journalist Mery Mogoll\u00f3n in August \r\n2010.<\/p>\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n Mogoll\u00f3n \r\ntells that the former director joined the oil industry in 1982, as an employee \r\nof Meneven, an extinct subsidiary of Pdvsa. Until 1999, \"Villita,\" as his \r\nclosest co-workers called him, was a middle manager with little growth \r\nprojection, which changed with the arrival of \r\nChavismo<\/I>.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n In \r\n2002, he became, together with Rafael Ram\u00edrez - current Venezuela's ambassador \r\nto the UN -, a member of the board led by the late economist Gast\u00f3n Parra \r\nLuzardo. This group of executives had to face the oil strike from December 2002 \r\nto February 2003, aimed to pressure President Hugo Ch\u00e1vez to change his \r\nrelationship with the oil industry and respect the meritocracy. In this context, \r\nVillanueva Rojas was engaged in documenting the losses that later served to open \r\ncriminal proceedings against executives of the state oil company, who were \r\ndismissed for joining the protest that caused losses of over 20 billion \r\ndollars.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n Despite \r\nthe changes in the industry, says Mogoll\u00f3n, the official stayed very close to \r\nAl\u00ed Rodr\u00edguez, president of Pdvsa (2002-2004), and then to Rafael Ram\u00edrez \r\n(2004-2014), although he did not stop criticizing, for example, the dispersion \r\nof resources in the social programs of Chavez, known as missions, which, in the \r\nopinion of Villanueva Rojas, could be considered as misappropriation of \r\nfunds.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n As \r\ngeneral auditor of Pdvsa and president of the Audit Committee, he was \r\nresponsible for signing the last balance sheet presented by the Venezuelan state \r\ncompany to the US Securities and Exchange Commission in 2006. The US authorities \r\ncriticized his multiplicity of positions. \"Based on the terms defined in the \r\nrules of Corporate Governance of the New York Stock Exchange, it is not \r\nconsidered independent,\" since - more informally explained -, as an auditor and \r\nmanager, he was both payer and payee.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n His \r\ncurrent wife, Maritza Rojas de Villanueva, also held top positions in the \r\nadministration of the oil industry, especially after 2003, when he was \r\ntransferred to Citgo, a Venezuelan oil subsidiary based in Houston, USA. In \r\n2011, she became Chief Treasurer of the company, as revealed by the letter of \r\npromotion of that time. That is why her husband frequently traveled to that \r\ncity.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n Villanueva \r\nRojas left Pdvsa in 2010 and began to work in the Caracas office of Gazprom, \r\nwhere he worked until 2011. From then on, his place of residence is unknown and \r\nthere is no more information about company Blue Sea \r\nEnterprises.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n Her \r\ndaughter says she does not remember the name of the company, but assures that no \r\ndocuments will be found to prove that she manages a Blue Sea Enterprises bank \r\naccount. \"If you do not have a document that says there is an account of that \r\ncompany in my name, you cannot say that I am the figurehead,\" she said when \r\ninterviewed by phone, and then added, \"Having that company in my father's name \r\nshould not be a problem.\"<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n According \r\nto Peruvian lawyer Oscar Solano, specialist in asset recovery in the legal \r\ndivision and consultancy of the International Center for Asset Recovery (ICAR) \r\nof the Basel Institute, \"the most reserved international definition of \r\nPolitically Exposed Persons (PEP), aims to reach not only the one person having \r\nthe political power - the public official - but all related persons, like his \r\nimmediate family, friends, partners and companies.\u201d In cases like these, says \r\nthe expert, a sanction to the company that carries out the management, imposed \r\nby the controlling agency of his country, is appropriate. However, Fincen, the \r\nagency of the US Department of the Treasury that uncovered the money laundering \r\nthrough the Private Bank of Andorra that involved four former officials of the \r\nVenezuelan government could also participate.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n In \r\ncooperation with Nayrobis Rodr\u00edguez from \r\nCuman\u00e1<\/I><\/p>\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/PP-30.jpg\")
Controversy<\/h2>\n\n\n
In the Name of the Father<\/h2>\n\n\n
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