Jesús Muñoz Tébar (

Caracas Caracas ( , ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern p ...

, 17 January 1847 – 21 September, 1909) was a Venezuelan

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

, soldier and politician, Minister of Public Works on five occasions during the government of

Antonio Guzmán Blanco Antonio Leocadio Guzmán Blanco (28 February 1829 – 28 July 1899) was a Venezuelan military leader, statesman, diplomat and politician. He was the president of Venezuela for , from 1870 until 1877, from 1879 until 1884, and from 1886 until 1 ...

. He was the

Minister of Finance A ministry of finance is a ministry or other government agency in charge of government finance, fiscal policy, and financial regulation. It is headed by a finance minister, an executive or cabinet position . A ministry of finance's portfolio ...

from 1908 to 1909.

Career

He studied in the Vargas School of

and graduated from the Military Academy of Mathematics in 1866 with the rank of Lieutenant of Engineers. A trusted official of Guzmán Blanco, three times president of Venezuela, he was called at the time the “constructor of the guzmancismo". Under his tenure as minister of Public Works, the government developed the construction of roads, bridges and railways in an attempt to improve the quality of life of Venezuela, then a purely

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry are typically desc ...

nation. In 1881 he finished the Municipal Theatre of Caracas whose construction was initiated in 1876 by the French architect Esteban Ricard, who had left the country in 1879. He kept the Venezuelan government informed about British presence near the disputed border, leading to the rupture of diplomatic relations with the British government. Muñoz Tébar was the rector of the

Central University of Venezuela Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...

for two terms, and the institution awarded him a Doctorate in Philosophical Sciences. In 1891 he published his book ''Personalismo y Legalismo'', dedicated to pointing out the conditions of the region after independence, focusing in the need to improve the educational system to achieve sustainable development and consequently end the current despotism. Muñoz Tébar died in Caracas on 21 September 1909.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Munoz Tebar, Jesus 1847 births 1909 deaths Finance ministers of Venezuela Venezuelan engineers Members of the Venezuelan Academy of Language Venezuelan military personnel Public works ministers of Venezuela Central University of Venezuela rectors People from Caracas