The gangster, the footballer and the union deal

Nick McKenzie and David Marin-Guzman

Jul 20, 2024 – 5.00am

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In late 2022, staff at national labour hire firm Zancott, a company which has provided workers to the National Broadband Network rollout, Melbourne’s Westgate Tunnel project, and a major defence force base upgrade, noticed some new faces in the office.

They were duly introduced to a dour-looking man called Frank and his ultra-fit companion Kayne Pettifer, the latter recognisable for the AFL fans in the Zancott office because he had played 113 games for Richmond.

Soon, word within Zancott spread that Frank’s real name was Faruk, and he had a public profile, although if Pettifer was famous thanks to his AFL career, Frank was more infamous.

Faruk Orman was freed because the case against him was tainted by barrister Nicola Gobbo’s dirty dealing. Justin McManus

Two years earlier, Faruk Orman had walked out of the Victorian Supreme Court into a throng of reporters and cameras, having just served 12 years for a gangland murder.

On the steps of court, a triumphant Orman was an underworld murderer no more. His conviction had been quashed after his barrister, Nicola Gobbo, was outed as Lawyer X, a secret police informer whose work snitching on her clients had poisoned their prosecution and convictions.

While Orman had quickly vanished from public view after his release, his appearance with Pettifer at Zancott would plant the seed that would ultimately land the ex-gangland figure at the centre of another very public scandal this week.

A series of reports by The Australian Financial Review, The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald and 60 Minutes alleged some in the CFMEU had joined forces with bikies and underworld figures, and were using all forms of muscle – industrial, political and, sometimes, underworld – to profit, including on NSW and Victoria government mega-projects.

In September 2022, the ex-AFL goal-sneak and the former gangland figure had aligned with Zancott to secure the company CFMEU support via Orman’s union back-channels. When their dealings with the Zancott Indigenous labour hire operation were exposed this week, former high-ranking law enforcement officials, including Labor Party-aligned, ex-Federal Police assistant commissioner Mark Ney described it as one of several case studies involving underworld figures monetising union support.

As this masthead’s ongoing reporting can reveal, Orman and Pettifer are not isolated cases, with alleged organised crime figures and bikie bosses deeply in bed with select union organisers, including on Victoria’s Big Build and the NSW government’s infrastructure projects.

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Separately, the CFMEU’s two most senior still-serving state bosses, NSW secretary Darren Greenfield and Victorian assistant secretary Derek Christopher (who is in line to replace John Setka, who quit his union post eight days ago), are clinging onto their positions, despite state and federal Labor moving to force their branches into administration and introduce a raft of reforms to combat this week’s stunning revelations.

But the story of Orman and Pettifer illustrates how some in the construction wing of the CFMEU, in Victoria and NSW at least, may have sold their union souls to favour mates instead of workers, no matter their ties to the underworld.

One aspect of their story highlights a disturbing practice also apparent in NSW: the provision of valuable, union-endorsed Enterprise Bargaining Agreements to certain companies, often via an underworld-linked facilitator and involving allegations that large sums need to be paid to secure CFMEU support.

This masthead is not suggesting that Orman or Pettifer have engaged in any criminal activity. However, their connection to the granting of an EBA that the CFMEU was forced to rip up this week is not in doubt.

The arrival of Orman to Zancott in 2022 was part of an arduous personal journey. From being a young gangland figure in the early 2000s, he morphed into a fixer for Mick Gatto and right-hand man to gun-for-hire Andrew “Benji” Veniamin, to a construction industry mover and shaker.

Faruk Orman with his lawyers Ruth Parker (left) and Carly Lloyd on the steps of the Supreme Court after his release from prison. Eddie Jim

In 2007, Orman was charged with murdering gangland heavy Victor Peirce five years earlier. He rebuffed police offers to cut a deal if he gave evidence against Gatto. Orman denied Gatto had any involvement in the execution, and there is no suggestion by this masthead that Gatto had any involvement in any murder or criminal offending. Gatto would go on to help fund Orman’s defence and even tattoo Orman’s name on his chest.

Released from prison in mid-2019, Orman is suing police for damages for the “miscarriage of justice”.

Behind the scenes, however, he was achieving success in his new life as a boss in the building industry. With little background in construction, from 2020, Orman started setting up concrete supplier companies under the banner of Allsafe. By 2021, he would have his first CFMEU EBA, key to getting work on major projects in Victoria.

Months later, Orman scored his first big coup. The CFMEU would grant Allsafe prized EBAs for labour hire and traffic control – agreements rarely handed out by the union.

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But there were hints that Orman had backers in the union. Corporate records show that in September 2022, Orman had helped to set up an Indigenous company for government projects called ZK Civil Infrastructure.

The CFMEU quickly granted ZK Civil a greenfields agreement, a special EBA reserved for new businesses that do not yet have employees. Industry sources told this masthead it was highly unusual for the CFMEU to grant a greenfields deal to a no-name subcontractor with no major project to work on.

Orman would tell the Fair Work Commission in a statutory declaration that he intended to employ up to 50 people, including Indigenous workers, for “already secured projects”, although none were identified.

According to corporate filings, a day after the commission approved the deal, Orman quit as director and sold all his shares to Pettifer, who had left the AFL to try his hand at boxing. Two days later, company records show Pettifer had partnered with the owner of Zancott, businessman Cameron Buzzacott, who the CFMEU had previously refused to give an EBA.

This week, an insider from the Zancott group of companies provided an account of the dealings between Orman, Pettifer and Buzzacott. The insider, who asked not to be named for fear of repercussions, said Buzzacott had called on Pettifer and Orman after failing at other attempts to get a CFMEU agreement, such as using an Indigenous elder to engage with the union.

“Buzzacott was open that Orman had the pull in the union to get the agreement. He said he was prepared to pay [a large amount] for it,” the insider said, describing plans for ZK to work with Zancott to supply workers on major Victorian projects.

“Frank [Orman] was in the office and on some sites we were pitching for. He seemed like a normal guy until I googled his background after I learned Zancott was trying to buy a union agreement.”

In an interview last week, Orman insisted that despite transferring his shares in ZK to Buzzacott and Pettifer, no money was paid for them or the EBA. Orman said he still had a background interest in the company.

“There might have been shares and directorship transfers for various reasons, to get bank loans or whatever it might be to fund it,” he said. “But the company’s never been sold or out of my control.”

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Asked how it was still in his control, he said: “Behind the scenes there are other agreements in place between various shareholders and directors.”

Pettifer, who described meeting Orman via the ex-footballer’s training firm, said he believed Buzzacott was the driver behind the creation of ZK. Pettifer said despite being a partner in the business, he didn’t know “the ins and outs of it all”, and hadn’t coughed up “any money” as part of any deal.

Buzzacott said he obtained ZK because he believed a union EBA “would assist my business activity in Victoria”. But he stressed that at the time ZK was registered, “I had not met or had any dealings with Orman. I have always acted in a totally ethical and proper manner in my business dealings,” he said.

Kayne Pettifer in action for Richmond in 2009. Sebastian Costanzo

He also claimed ZK was dormant, having never realised its aim of winning valuable labour hire contracts. He said his business focus was on Zancott.

Orman denies any suggestion his relationships with Gatto or any other underworld players, or special relationships with the CFMEU, helped deliver ZK, or any of his other construction firms, union EBAs.

“I go through the process like every other company does,” he said, stressing his old underworld connections have “nothing to do with my business or my work, or any of that”.

Since this masthead reported on the ZK Civil EBA last week, CFMEU national secretary Zach Smith said the union had taken steps to terminate it. Pettifer also sought to deregister the company on Wednesday.

If the Albanese government can overcome flagged CFMEU challenges to place the union’s state branches under external control, it will be up to an independent administrator to untangle the full story of ZK’s union agreement.

As part of this masthead’s major investigation, an underworld-linked businessman and self-styled CFMEU fixer, Harry Korras, was caught on a covert recording claiming he could deliver companies union EBAs in return for large kickbacks to union insiders.

A construction industry source has separately told this masthead, on condition of anonymity, that for $200,000-plus, Gatto claims to resolve disputes between building companies and unions.

In NSW, union boss Greenfield is under intense scrutiny for delivering multiple EBAs to companies with known underworld links.

While administrators typically have control over a union’s books after they are appointed, the money trail around construction industry deal-making is likely to be decidedly more complicated, law enforcement officials say.

It is unclear precisely what powers the CFMEU administrator would have, although what is certain is that they would need to use them if they hope to shine a light into the Australian building industry’s darker corners.