Jesús Muñoz Tébar

Jesús Muñoz Tébar (Caracas, 17 January 1847 – 21 September, 1909) was a Venezuelan engineer, soldier and politician, Minister of Public Works on five occasions during the government of Antonio Guzmán Blanco.

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 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.

Muñoz Tébar was the rector of the Central University of Venezuela 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.