Army and Air Force Exchange Service officials have named a replacement company to provide customer service for home Internet, telephone and cell phone service on U.S. military bases in South Korea.
NEO Communication Co. Ltd. will replace Concordia Co. Ltd. AAFES dropped Concordia because of its ties to a businessman convicted of bribing AAFES officials.
NEO will work as a subcontractor of LG Dacom, which holds an AAFES communications contract.
LG Dacom had brought in Concordia as a subcontractor in early 2007. But AAFES moved to drop Concordia after officials learned in September that Concordia had "an apparent business relationship" with businessman Jeong Gi-hwan.
South Korean corporate documents list Jeong as a Concordia director, AAFES has said.
A South Korean court convicted Jeong in January on charges he interfered with international trade by bribing AAFES officials. The alleged bribes were to help his Internet company, SSRT, hold the lucrative AAFES Internet and phone contract now held by LG Dacom. SSRT is also known as Samsung Rental Corp. Ltd.
LG Dacom selected NEO as the replacement for Concordia, and AAFES approved the switch, Larry M. Marshall, an official of AAFES at its Dallas headquarters, said in an e-mail to Stars and Stripes.
The transition is "expected to be seamless," Marshall said, and will be completed sometime early this month. NEO began providing service on Nov. 21, he said in the e-mail.
Federal agents arrested Jeong in Dallas last month on charges arising from the SSRT case.
He’s charged with bribery, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and conspiracy to commit bribery.