Siemens fights bribery allegations

A high-level management meeting at Siemens headquarters in Nigeria went beyond the scheduled time to address Siemen's concern over a bribery scam in Nigeria and Russia that led to the Federal Executive Council putting a ban on all its official transactions.

It is alleged that Siemens was involved with over €12 million in a bribery scam in Nigeria and Russia, while an estimated €10 million was expended on Nigerian government officials - mostly Ministers of Communications in the last eight years.

Confirming the marathon session, Siemens' Head of Corporate Communications, Olusegun Akinlabi, said he could not comment on the official reaction of the company for now, but noted that the meetings have been going on since morning till late afternoon on Wednesday, 5 December 2007.

"Actually, I don't know what the management reactions would be, but meetings are going on right now," he declared.

As to when he thinks the official reaction would be made, Akinlabi said he did not know, but reassured that the Siemens management in Nigeria "would react at the appropriate time."

Siemens first made its imports in the 1950s and established the first project for hydro power station in Kainji in 1964. Two years later, it established Siemens Resident Engineers Office in Lagos, and Siemens Nigeria Limited was officially incorporated in 1970. This was renamed Siemens Limited Nigeria in 1997 with a stake of Siemens AG going up to 68% as of year 2000.

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