2 charged with corruption

The following article was published in the Straits Times on 2 September 2010.

2 charged with corruption
By Elena Chong
Straits Times, Sep 2, 2010

Photo caption: Beh Soo Hong -- ST PHOTO: WONG KWAI CHOW

A MAN was charged in court on Wednesday with corruptly getting an $18,000 bribe from a subcontractor for himself and another in relation to an upgrading project at Changi Airport.

Beh Soo Hong, 43, was a mechanical and electrical coordinator of Takenaka Corporation when he and Mohamad Najib Solihin allegedly obtained the bribe from Mr Raymond Loh Ton Yong at a carpark of Changi Airport in 2008.

Mr Loh was a director of Air System Technology, then the subcontractor undertaking the air-conditioner installation work for the upgrading project at Terminal 1.

The bribe was said to have been given in return for Najib to approve AST's application for a 'permit-to-work' and not to find fault with the upgrading works being undertaken by the company.

Najib, 45, then a technical officer with Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore, has since been jailed for six months and ordered to pay a penalty of the total amount of bribes he received.

In another case, Takenaka's former senior foreman Heng Yan Kang, 44, was accused of abetting Najib to corruptly get a $3,700 watch from Mr Pour Beng Quey, a director of Hsuen Chow, in return for approving the subcontractor's application for a 'permit-to-work' without delay and refraining from finding fault with the company's upgrading work at Terminal 1.

The two men's cases will be mentioned in a week's time.

If convicted, they can be fined up to $100,000 and/or jailed for up to five years for corruption.