Hong Kong, April 15: The head of McDonald`s restaurants in Hong Kong was convicted on Wednesday of conspiracy after taking over USD 300,000 in bribes from a Thai company that supplied corn to the fast food chain, authorities said.
Lau Si-sing, 49, McDonald`s former managing director, was
also found guilty of pressuring the unidentified Thai company
to lie to investigators, according to Hong Kong`s anti-graft
agency, the Independent Commission Against Corruption.
Lau was accused of asking an executive at the food
supplier to pay him kickbacks equal to some 10 per cent of
corn sales to McDonald`s in Hong Kong, officials said. The
eatery serves corn as a side dish.
Between 2005 and 2007, he accepted some 2.5 million Hong
Kong dollars (USD 320,000) from the supplier, deposited to his
and his wife`s bank accounts.
McDonald`s said Lau has been fired.
"McDonald`s does not tolerate criminal wrongdoing, or
breaches of its code of conduct for employees," the company
said in a statement.
Lau joined the fast food giant in Los Angeles in 1983,
according to an earlier press release on the company`s Web
site.
He was the managing director of McDonald`s in the
Philippines for three years before taking up the top post in
Hong Kong in May 2004.
Bureau Report
