But when wealthy Guadalajara businessman Jorge Vergara went on television earlier this month to announce he was separating from his wife, the media buzz gathered speed rapidly.
At the same time as revealing the end of his seven-year marriage to Angelica Fuentes, the 60-year-old owner of the local Chivas soccer franchise and Omnilife nutrition and dietary supplements firm also announced that his wife was being summarily removed from her role as executive president of the companies.
Vergara said he had been alerted to “irregularities” into Fuentes’ financial management at Grupo Omnilife-Chivas, as well as the spinoff cosmetics company, Angelissima.
“I have to admit that I was a little blind and did not realize what was happening,” Vergara told the Univision network. “There are multiple aspects to this and we are investigating them.”
But Fuentes, 52, who is active on social media and tweets prolifically about gender rights and other issues, is not taking her dismissal lying down. In 2013, in addition to promoting her from director to president of Grupo Omnlife-Chivas, Vergara gifted her 43 percent of the company’s share holding (it currently stands at 49 percent, while Vergara holds 51 percent, reports indicate).
In what looks to be the start of a lengthy and costly legal battle, Fuentes has called for a general assembly of shareholders on April 29 in a bid to get herself reinstated as the company’s chef executive. Vergara said this week the move is illegal and that there is “no chance” of his wife returning to the post.
After a whirlwind romance, Vergara and Fuentes married in 2008 in a lavish, five-day ceremony in India that was given extensive coverage by Quien, Mexico’s leading celebrity culture magazine.
The couple have openly encouraged media coverage of their liaison, presumably believing that publicizing their seemingly happily relationship has a positive spin-off effect on their business enterprises.
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