CCAC | Civil Engineering Lab employees involved in bribery case

The Commission Against Corruption (CCAC) has found that two Civil Engineering Laboratory (LEC) employees allegedly accepted bribes from an engineering company for assistance in producing false soil test reports, the anti-graft agency revealed in a press release.
According to CCAC, the two employees allegedly committed active and passive bribery as well as document forgery offenses — all regarded as illicit acts in Macau’s Criminal Code. These crimes can result in imprisonment for a maximum term of three to eight years.
The case dates back to May last year when a section of a public road outside a gaming company’s large-scale casino construction project caved in just a few days after the completion of road works and the reopening of the pavement section to traffic.
The gaming company then contacted the roadworks’ general contractor and requested that its subcontractor follow up on the matter and present relevant soil test reports. However, CCAC found that the subcontractor was not in possession of any soil test reports at the time road works took place. This would have resulted in the section of road again being closed to traffic, in order for soil tests to be conducted.
“To save the hassle, a senior officer surnamed Mak and an external engineering consultant surnamed Tai, from the subcontracting company, decided to submit soil test reports to the general contractor without doing the digging all over again,” CCAC revealed in a press release.
An investigation launched by CCAC found that Tai offered bribes amounting to MOP40,000 to an engineer and a laboratory technician from the Civil Engineering Laboratory, who in return produced 10 fraudulent soil test reports.
These reports were later sent to the general contractor by senior officer Mak as proof of soil quality in the relevant road section.
“During the investigation some [people involved] have confessed to having accepted bribes from people within the subcontracting company and to having produced bogus test reports without actually taking samples or conducting examinations,” CCAC added.
CCAC’s staff found that there were noticeable cracks in the road section, which was only opened to traffic less than half a year ago. To ensure the safety of drivers and road users, CCAC notified competent authorities.
CCAC said that the case has been referred to the Public Prosecutions Office (MP) for further investigation.
Recently, CCAC also unveiled a bribery case involving high-
ranking officials at the Marine and Water Bureau. CP