German Siemens firm denounces a scam in contracts with Sonatrach

During the hearing session of one of the accused namely Belkacem Boumediene, a question put by the Attorney General at the trial of the “Sonatrach 1” bribery scandal now underway at the criminal court of Algiers, revealed that the German Company Siemens unwittingly withdrew from a project for the fitting out of 123 energy facilities in southern Algeria with remote-controlled monitoring and electronic protection systems.

As part of the hearing’s revelations, the German Company Siemens decided to pull out from the deal after noticing gross alterations in the contract terms made by some Sonatrach senior executives notably the splitting into several lots to be shared among several foreign bidding companies, including the German company “Contel Funkwerk”.

This situation prompted Siemens to sharply denounce such illegal practices in a letter motivating its withdrawal, and accusing by the same token Sonatrach of indulging in gross manipulations in the conclusion of contracts.

The Attorney General showed the relevant letter sent by Siemens denouncing this dirty scam that was to divide the project into four lots to be assigned to several OTC companies including “Contel Funkwerk”, after the surprising cancellation of the tender.

However, the law is clear-cut on the matter as the allotment of any project is done in a single batch to the company that makes the lowest evaluated offer and this was the case for the bidding Siemens company.