Foreign bribery investigation launched into Sydney-based construction company Lifese with links to terrorists
Australia's second ever foreign bribery investigation has been launched into a Sydney-based construction company with links to some of Australia's most notorious terrorists.
After a series of raids in Sydney last week, federal police charged the directors of construction company Lifese - Mamdouh and Ibrahim Elomar - with foreign bribery offences.
It is alleged the two attempted to bribe Iraqi government officials in order to secure multi-million-dollar contracts there.
Mamdouh's son, Mohammed, is one of Australia's most wanted terrorists, infamous for posing with the severed heads of victims believed to have been killed by Islamic radicals in Syria.
Mamdouh's other brother, Mohammed Ali Elomar, is in jail for one of Australia's largest terror plots.
Within hours of the AFP's raids on the firm's offices last Thursday, the former opposition leader of the New South Wales Liberal Party, John Dowd, resigned as chairman of Lifese where he was a director for over six years.
Earlier this week AFP Commissioner Andrew Colvin confirmed it was only the second foreign bribery case to reach the courts.
"The AFP holds 14 active foreign bribery investigations at the moment," he said.
"Of those though, only 13 have foreign bribery as a primary offence and I will say that of those 14 only nine are publicly known at this stage.
"Two matters are at court and neither are resolved."
No charges have been laid against Mr Dowd, and the ABC makes no suggestion of legal impropriety on his part.
The former NSW attorney-general and retired Supreme Court judge confirmed to the ABC he had resigned from the Lifese board but was unable to comment further as the matter was before the courts.
Foreign bribery case a 'wake-up call' to company directors
Neville Tiffen, director with Transparency International Australia and former head of global compliance for Rio Tinto, said it was the duty of directors to ensure their company was abiding by the law.
"Having another prosecution in Australia for foreign bribery really should be a wake-up call to all directors and executives, both listed and non-listed companies," he said.
"If I was a director of any company I'd be really checking my compliance programs, not just for the sake of the company but for the sake of the shareholders and even for my own sake.
"The chairman as, if you like, the senior director, it's obvious he's in a pivotal position to guide the company.
"He should be making sure the board is asking the right questions of management, really testing out management, really making sure they're digging deep and to find out any weak spots in the processes."
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has been critical of Australia's handling of foreign bribery matters.
The director of Melbourne University's centre for corporate law, Professor Ian Ramsay, said Australia had been "on notice for quite some years now".
"To some degree the Government has responded," he said.
"For example, several years ago they substantially increased the penalties where it is proven that someone engages in bribery of a foreign public official, but there's more to the issue here than simply increasing the penalties or having strong law on the books.
"At the same time, we need very strong enforcement and I think it would be true to say that the Australian record over a number of years has been fairly patchy, particularly under those provisions of the Criminal Code Act that deal with bribery of foreign officials."
Mamdouh and Ibrahim Elomar will appear in court on foreign bribery charges next month and face jail sentences of up to 10 years if found guilty.
