Broadcast of a W radio program on August 30, 2018. W RADIO
The PRISA Group (editor of this newspaper) reported this Monday on the status of the lawsuit that is advancing with Corporativo Coral after businessmen Miguel Alemán and Carlos Cabal Peniche tried to take control of Radiópolis by force.
The lawyer Jesús Guerra, spokesperson and legal representative of PRISA, has affirmed that the company is moving forward with its intention to reach an international arbitration to settle the differences in the dispute.
This after a judge in Mexico City denied Coral the precautionary measures requested on August 26, which were intended to maintain the state of things after the businessmen tried to impose a cadre of directors to gain editorial control of Radiópolis .
On September 17, the Superior Court of Justice of Mexico City agreed to PRISA's challenges.
A judge denied Corporativo Coral the precautionary measures with which it sought to maintain control of the radio group, achieved through the shareholders' meetings of August 21 and 25, which are considered by Grupo PRISA as "highly questionable" and which motivated the group to go to court.
The PRISA Group took legal action to preserve the proper functioning of Radiópolis and so that its professionals can continue to carry out their work with the rigor and independence that characterizes them.
The court's decision brings the parties closer to the international conciliation process to settle their differences.
Each one of the companies must choose an arbitrator and the award, raised before an international trade institution, must be resolved within a period of six months.
Jesús Guerra Méndez stressed that the participation of Grupo PRISA, which owns 50% of the shares of the Mexican radio group, which manages 17 radio stations throughout Mexico, “is adjusted to the General Directorate of Foreign Investment of the Ministry of Economy and all Mexican laws ”.
In February 2018, Televisa, then owner of 50% of the shares of Radiópolis, informed the PRISA Group of its intention to sell its share package.
PRISA had bought its shares from Televisa in 2001. Televisa entered PRISA so that it could contribute its know-how in terms of operating the radio business.
To this end, the shareholders agreed that PRISA would propose the CEO of Radiópolis (which would later have to be approved by the Board of Directors), capable of assembling a first-line team and putting that know-how into application.
As a result, Radiópolis' audiences, revenues and profits increased very significantly, achieving leadership positions.
In the second half of 2018, Televisa informed PRISA that the buyer of the shares it owned would be Miguel Alemán Magnani, president of the board of directors of the Interjet airline.
PRISA and the businessman signed on December 12, 2018 an agreement with the basic terms of what should be their relationship as partners in Radiopolis, in which the operating rules that had been operating successfully in previous years were maintained.
Based on this agreement, PRISA authorized Televisa to transfer its shares to Alemán Magnani.
The Mexican businessman made the purchase of the shares through a company controlled by him, Corporativo Coral, which signed a Radiópolis shareholders agreement with PRISA on July 17, 2019, which includes and develops what was agreed by both parties in the agreement December 2018 and includes the bylaws that must be approved by the Radiópolis shareholders' meeting, once the purchase of the shares by Coral has been completed.
That same day, Coral signed a contract to purchase the shares with Televisa.
This contract conditions the sale of the shares to receive authorization from the Federal Telecommunications Institute (IFT) and to Coral paying the purchase price below.
The IFT authorized the sale in August 2019, but due to liquidity problems, Coral breached its obligation to pay.
Televisa sued Coral for the breach.
Finally, on July 2, Coral completed the payment to Televisa.
To get the financing, Coral asked certain investors for money.
Alemán Magnani informally informed PRISA that some investors would enter directly into Coral's capital and the Mexican businessman would always maintain control of at least 51% of Coral.
On July 8, a meeting was held for the Radiópolis team and the PRISA team to meet Coral's new investors, with Teresa Pasini, wife of Carlos Cabal Peniche, presenting herself as such;
Samantha del Valle, daughter of businessman Alejandro del Valle and Rosa Rubio, wife of Carlos Aguirre, who was director of Grupo Radio Centro.
Aguirre passed away on September 13.
At a meeting on July 8, it was agreed to hold the shareholders 'meeting agreed in the Shareholders' Agreement.
Alemán Magnani, who had become president of the Board of Directors upon his entry into the capital of Radiopolis, never convened the aforementioned assembly, despite having been formally required to do so.
Instead, it told PRISA that there were points in the shareholders' contract that needed to be modified;
Coral sent a minutes signed by Alemán Magnani of a never-held meeting in which, among other points that violate what was agreed in the shareholders' contract, he intended to appoint the Director of Radio Hablada Content, the Director of News and the Deputy Director of Noticieros Informativos. , as well as Carlos Cabal Peniche as vice president of the Editorial Committee of Radiópolis.
Cabal Peniche personifies like few others the darker side of the links between political and business power in Mexico, especially during the time of former president Carlos Salinas de Gortari (1988-1994).
For many years, he was one of the PRI's favorite businessmen until in 1994 he fled the country and ended up imprisoned in Australia accused of shady operations at his bank.
Between July 20 and 27, 2020, the lawyer for the new investors partially informed PRISA that Coral's shares were transferred to a trust.
Alemán Magnani keeps only 10%.
PRISA notified its partners on August 19 that this breached the shareholders' contract.
The situation reached an extreme situation on August 25, when Alemán Magnani summoned Francisco Cabañas, director of Radiópolis, to its foundation.
The Mexican businessman demanded that Cabañas, in front of Cabal Peniche, a notary and lawyers, sign his resignation and allow a security company to enter the Radiópolis facilities south of Mexico City.