August 24, 2006

Senior AWB exec quits Australian wheat exporter

A senior AWB executive who headed the company's response team to the Iraq kickbacks inquiry has quit the company, AWB announced Thursday (Aug 24).

Jill Gillingham, general manager technology and business process, who this week gave evidence to the Cole inquiry examining the kickbacks scandal, would leave AWB at the end of this month, an AWB spokesman said.

Gillingham's resignation follows the departure of at least four other senior executives from AWB, including former managing director Andrew Lindberg, chief legal advisor Jim Cooper, company secretary Richard Fuller and ex-marketing chief Charles Stott.

Gillingham was chosen last November to head Project Lilac, a team set up to respond to the Cole inquiry into the kickbacks scandal.

She originally joined AWB in July 2000 as chief information officer, a member of the company's executive leadership group, and filled in as acting chief executive while Lindberg was on leave in late 2004.