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Investigation into the awarding of transport for NSW and Inner West Council Contracts (Operation Hector)

Investigation report · Independent Commission Against Corruption (NSW ICAC) · New South Wales · Published

Findings
10
Published responses
7
Report length
192 pages

Official source

Investigation into the awarding of transport for NSW and Inner West Council Contracts (Operation Hector)

PDF · 192 pages · 4.4 MB · icac.nsw.gov.au

Summary

Generated summary: written by an AI model from the report text and checked against the cited pages.

Findings 10

Allegations are not findings. A commission's finding or opinion of corrupt conduct or misconduct is not a finding that a person is guilty of a criminal offence, and the commissions say so in their reports.

  1. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Nguyen engaged in serious corrupt conduct by:

    Report, page 10, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  2. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Abdi engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • in 2014, misusing his public official position with TfNSW to manipulate the tender process for the Glenfield Junction car park defect rectification work, to ensure the contract was awarded to ASN Contractors, in return for which he received a benefit of approximately $30,000 (chapter 3) • in 2018, engaging in collusive dealings with Mr Sanber and Mr Aziz to secure the TfNSW Victoria Street Station work for Sanber Group, and receiving substantial secret payments in relation to that project. Mr Abdi also acted partially towards Sanber Group in the course of his duties as a TfNSW public official, in circumstances where he failed to disclose his financial interest in Sanber Group to TfNSW (chapter 5) • between 2019 and 2020, colluding with Mr Nguyen and Mr Pilli to favour RJS Infrastructure in the awarding of building and landscaping subcontracts at the Kingswood Station upgrade. He manipulated the tender process for those contracts to favour RJS Infrastructure, and provided confidential Downer budget information he received from Mr Pilli to Mr Nguyen, resulting in collusive tendering, so that work was awarded to RJS Infrastructure.

    Report, page 12, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  3. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Sanber engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • in 2014, colluding with Mr Abdi and Mr Aziz to manipulate the tender process for the Glenfield Junction car park defect rectification work, to ensure that the TfNSW contract for that work was awarded to ASN Contractors, a company in which he was part owner with Mr Abdi and Mr Nguyen. As a result of engaging in this conduct, he received a benefit divided between them, totalling $125,000, being profit derived by ASN Contractors (chapter 3) • in 2018, engaging in collusive dealings with Mr Aziz, Mr Nguyen and Mr Abdi, to secure the TfNSW Victoria Street Station work for Sanber Group, and making substantial secret payments in relation to that project (chapter 5).

    Report, page 12, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  4. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Pilli engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • between 2019 and 2020, colluding with Mr Abdi to favour RJS Infrastructure in the awarding of building and landscaping subcontracts at the Kingswood Station upgrade. He manipulated the tender processes for those contracts to favour RJS Infrastructure and provided confidential Downer budget information to Mr Abdi, which resulted in collusive tendering so that work was awarded to RJS Infrastructure. In return, Mr Pilli received approximately $101,500, being his share of the $331,000 profit derived by RJS Infrastructure (chapter 8).

    Report, page 12, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  5. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Nguy engaged in serious corrupt conduct by:

    Report, page 12, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  6. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Laphai engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • providing a financial benefit to Mr Nguyen of about $60,000 and a mobile telephone costing $970, as a reward for Mr Nguyen misusing his public official position with IWC to arrange for the awarding of approximately $1,606,464.24 (including GST) of IWC work to Mr Laphai’s company, SDL, between about October 2017 and July 2019 (chapter 4).

    Report, page 13, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  7. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Cox engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • in early-2020, in concert with Mr Nguyen, paying $25,000 to Mr Vardanega as a reward for Mr Vardanega misusing his position at Sydney Trains to improperly assist RJS Infrastructure to obtain work at Macdonaldtown Station, which involved Mr Vardanega providing a competitor’s methodology document and confidential pricing information to Mr Cox and RJS Infrastructure (chapter 10).

    Report, page 13, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  8. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Vardanega engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • in September 2019, misusing his position at Sydney Trains to improperly assist RJS Infrastructure to obtain work at Macdonaldtown Station by providing a competitor’s methodology document and confidential pricing information to Mr Cox of RJS Infrastructure, for which he received $25,000 from Mr Cox in 2020 (chapter 10).

    Report, page 13, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  9. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Aziz engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • in 2018, engaging in collusive dealings with Mr Sanber, Mr Nguyen and Mr Abdi to secure the TfNSW Victoria Street Station work for Sanber Group, and receiving substantial secret payments in relation to that project (chapter 5) • between July 2018 and September 2019, engaging in collusive dealings with Mr Nguyen to secure the TfNSW Central Station work for RJS Infrastructure, and receiving substantial secret payments in relation to that project (chapter 6) • between 28 February 2019 and 31 March 2020, using his position as a Downer project manager on the Lithgow Station TfNSW NIF project to influence the awarding of the Lithgow Station civil works package to RJS Infrastructure, and approving inflated variations, in exchange for a financial benefit of around $221,000 (excluding GST). His conduct also included collusive dealings with Mr Nguyen (chapter 7).

    Report, page 13, Summary of investigation and outcomes

  10. serious corrupt conduct

    Finding

    The Commission found that Mr Panagakis engaged in serious corrupt conduct by: • between June and September 2020, misusing his position within TfNSW to disclose to his TfNSW colleague, Mr Abdi, the TfNSW bills of quantity and other confidential information relating to the Wollstonecraft, Birrong, Roseville and Banksia TAP station upgrades for the purpose of assisting RJS Infrastructure to obtain TfNSW work, knowing that Mr Abdi was a silent partner, or at least had a financial interest, in RJS Infrastructure (chapter 11).

    Report, page 13, Summary of investigation and outcomes

Recommendations

No recommendations are reproduced in this record. This does not establish that the report contains none.

Published responses 7

Official documents 2

Coverage

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