CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan food company Polar, the South American nation’s largest private firm, yesterday denounced harassment by state intelligence agents who have been stationed at the gates of its headquarters since late last week.
Lorenzo Mendoza, owner of the conglomerate, said armed and masked officers from the Sebin intelligence agency have also been stationed outside his residence for no apparent reason.
“I simply wanted to make this statement to reject the persecution and harassment that my workers, my family, and I have been subjected to by the political police,” said Mendoza, surrounded by cheering workers, in comments to reporters.
The agents were stationed outside the company’s headquarters after the opposition coalition announced a one-day strike for Friday to demand a recall referendum on the rule of Maduro, who is struggling to control an unraveling socialist economy.
The government had said it would jail business leaders that joined the strike, which Polar did not.
Reuters was unable to obtain comment from the office of the vice presidency, which oversees Sebin.
Tensions between Polar and the government of President Nicolas Maduro have been constant. Maduro frequently accuses Mendoza of intentionally slowing food production to create shortages and weaken his government.
Mendoza has said the company has been forced to cut back production of staple items such as corn flour, an elemental part of the Venezuelan diet, because it cannot obtain dollars through the state run currency controls to import raw materials.
Venezuela’s government retains exclusive control over legal sales of hard currency, but has been unable to provide the greenbacks needed by the economy as a result of low oil prices.
