A photo contest set up by scandal-ridden engineering firm SNC-Lavalin is backfiring on the company.
The Montreal-based firm offered an iPad Mini to the winner of a photo contest that asked users to send their best photos of SNC-Lavalin projects across the country.
But Twitter users, using the campaign’s hashtag #ourprojects or #nosprojets, quickly attracted references to accusations of corruption and fraud surrounding the company.
A former vice president of the company, Stephane Roy, was arrested earlier this week in connection with an investigation into corruption surrounding the construction of the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal. Others arrested in connection with this probe include Pierre Duhaime, Riadh Ben Aissa and Arthur Porter.
The company has also been investigated over its financial ties to the Gaddafi family of Libya, as well as allegations of bribes surrounding the Jacques Cartier Bridge renovation.
The campaign yielded some decent photos of SNC’s projects:
But many tweets instead focused on the company’s woes. One contestant posted a screenshot of the news of Roy's arrest, asking if he would win the iPad. We doubt it...
Some people on Twitter sensed the trap early on. "That's a risky exercise given the news, it seems to me," one person tweeted:
— Translated from Le Huffington Post Quebec