Top executives of Australian broadband company NBN face heat over Alcatel dealings

Amidst criticism over their earlier association with Alcatel, two top executives of NBN Co, the company rolling out the national broadband network in Australia, have sought to distance themselves from an international corruption scandal involving the French telecom giant Alcatel, their former employer.

From 2004 to 2007, NBN's chief financial officer, Jean-Pascal Beaufret, was a member on the board of the Alcatel subsidiary that is involved in the scandal. The scandal has cost the company $137 million in fines imposed by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Mike Quigley, chief executive of NBN Co, was among the highest paid executives at Alcatel when the company and its staff were paying kickbacks against lucrative contracts.
In a statement NBN Co said Quigley and Beaufret had nothing to do with the payment of millions of dollars in bribes between 2002 and 2006.

However, according to the Coalition, the bribery scandal casts doubts over the government's $36 billion broadband network. Broadband spokesman, Malcolm Turnbull, remains unconvinced about the men being not aware of millions of dollars in bribes flowing to government officials from their senior positions.

The NBN statement said: ''The actions of a number of individual Alcatel-Lucent employees … fell outside the accountability and jurisdiction of both Mr Quigley and Mr Beaufret''.

The French telecom giant remains the sole supplier of telecom equipment NBN Co.