Daily Lessons from Life 17 September 2010 - SPH senior executive sacked over graft - September 17, 2010

"Published September 17, 2010 The Business Times - SPH senior executive sacked over graft

Police report made after Peter Khoo confesses; external auditors alerted

A senior vice-president of Singapore Press Holdings has been fired after he admitted to stealing shopping vouchers and taking kickbacks over a number of years.

Peter Khoo, an SPH employee of 22 years, has made restitution of $196,500 for the misappropriated vouchers and the illegal payments he received, the media company said in a statement yesterday."

A sad situation and not an easy one for the folks at SPH, the main news media company, to report on. A report on one of their finest executives on graft charges.

Lessons for me are:

1. violation of ethical standard and code of conducts can happened to anyone regardless of their position or compensation package. It is especially disheartening to learn of senior and highly paid people committed such a crime as they should have less motives to want to take advantage of the company's given that they are well recognized and well compensated to perform their jobs!;

2. there may be many reasons why he did what he had done. One of the usual suspects has to be: Personal Integrity. Surely he can afford those vouchers he misappropriated though we are not sure how much kickbacks has he hoarded. Unless he has increase appetite as his status rises and his salary package rises, otherwise he should be able to living comfortably without behaving in this manner that got him into great bother! Personal Integrity includes responsible consumption. Knowing what is decency! Again, hard to mandate as it is so personal!! Hence, we need to tag it to the average Chan, Ali or Raj to make sense;

3. as he has 'confessed' to his crimes and made restitution to the company, he will still face the judgement of the laws as the case was reported to the police. Hopefully when the police investigation is done, he will be given the due sentencing that befit his crimes while those who gave him the kickbacks should also be brought to justice. The culture of giving kickbacks thrives because they are givers who believed that such practices gave them the advantage over other who do not give! If the givers get away scotch free, the practice will continue as every entrepreneurial ones will try to give kickbacks to gain unfair advantages.

May people learn from this case and to be truthful to not 'stealing' or 'taking advantages' of situations at work! Be vigilant.