United Petroleum revealed as group behind alleged OTR smear campaign

The founder of the OTR empire says the company is considering it’s legal options after being stunned by court revelations over an alleged smear campaign.

The Civic Partnership former executive David Lau, Peregrine Corporation’s Sam Shahin and The Civic Partnership managing partner Jason Aldworth.

The founder of the OTR empire says the company is in shock after the identities behind an alleged smear campaign against OTR were revealed in court, fuelling a potential legal stoush between some of the country’s wealthiest petrol barons.

United Petroleum, founded by rich listers Eddie Hirsch and Avi Silver, has been named as the mystery client of The Civic Partnership, with documents revealing it paid the influential public relations and lobbying firm more than $100,000 to conduct the social media campaign on its behalf.

OTR launched Federal Court proceedings against The Civic Partnership in March, over claims one of its senior executives set up fake social media identities to damage the reputation of the company while it was defending a multimillion-dollar underpayment class action.

Earlier this month Federal Court judge Patrick O’Sullivan ordered that documents confirming the identity of the client that engaged The Civic Partnership be provided to OTR as part of a pre-trial discovery process.

The details of those documents remained secret until Wednesday morning when Mark Hoffman KC, representing OTR in court, revealed the petrol station chain founded by Adelaide’s Shahin family was exploring potential legal action against its rival.

Avi Silver pictured in 2018. Picture: David Geraght / The Australian.

United petroleum chief executive David Szymczak.

“The documents that have been discovered, comprising of invoices and bank statements recording payments – we’ve seen that what that has disclosed is that the client ... is United Petroleum,” he said.

“What’s clear is that United Petroleum paid about $120,000, inclusive of GST, for what has occurred - and your honour would be unsurprised to hear that’s of great concern to my clients.”

OTR founder Yasser Shahin said the family was “shocked” by the revelations, and it was considering its legal options.

“OTR was shocked to finally discover ... that United Petroleum, whose directors are Melbourne businessmen Avi Silver and Eddie Hirsch ... went to the extent of engaging The Civic Partnership who used aliases and fictitious Facebook pages, twitter accounts, encrypted proton email accounts and Change.org petitions,” he said.

“It has taken almost two years and proceedings initially in the Supreme Court of South Australia and subsequently the Federal Court to do so.

“We are grateful that the court has ordered permanent injunctions preventing the respondent in this case, The Civic Partnership, from engaging in the misleading and deceptive conduct that was the subject of our claims as well as other injunctions to stop misuse of images owned by us.

“We are considering further legal avenues of redress as a result of today’s revelations. United’s actions are simply unconscionable and un-Australian.”

OTR on Wednesday secured an injunction against The Civic Partnership, preventing the PR firm and its employees from engaging in the type of conduct included in OTR’s claims against it.

The proceedings were dismissed, but the fuel and convenience giant secured a court order allowing it to use the documents linking United Petroleum with the alleged smear campaign in any potential legal action it might pursue against its rival fuel company and its directors.

Hirsch and Silver, the Israeli co-founders and directors of United Petroleum, are among Australia’s wealthiest businessman. After establishing United Petroleum in 1993, they have grown the network to more than 500 petrol stations across the country – including more than 250 Pie Face outlets – and a substantial fuel terminal business.

According to the The Australian’s latest Richest 250 list, the duo are estimated to have amassed a $4.36bn fortune.

United Petroleum has been contacted for comment.

OTR, the company established by the Shahin family’s Peregrine Corporation and acquired by fuel giant Viva Energy for $1.2bn this year, previously accused The Civic Partnership of running a campaign designed to damage the company’s reputation in the wake of a class action that alleged OTR underpaid hundreds of staff over several years.

Sam Shahin, Viva Energy managing director Scott Wyatt, Yasser Shahin and Charlie Shahin. Picture: Supplied

A $5.8m settlement of the class action was reached in August 2022.

OTR claimed that over the course of 2021 and 2022 The Civic Partnership and David Lau, one of the PR firm’s senior executives at the time, created a website and petition, and used social media platforms Facebook and X, to share stories of aliases appearing to be aggrieved former employees and victims of misconduct by OTR, but who were in fact fabricated identities created by Mr Lau to promote the interests of The Civic Partnership’s clients.

OTR claimed none of the aliases created by Mr Lau – including “Jack Musk”, “Sean Cook” and “Joey Wong” – had ever been employees of the company.

The Civic Partnership previously admitted that aliases were created by Mr Lau as part of a social media campaign “in relation to the OTR business”, but denied the campaign was “designed to damage the applicants’ business and reputation”.

The Shahin family’s Peregrine Corporation was founded by the late family patriarch Fred Shahin, who started the business after fleeing to Australia as a Palestinian refugee in 1948.

His sons Charlie, Sam and Yasser later joined the business, and grew the network to more than 170 sites, predominantly in South Australia, before agreeing to the sale deal with ASX-listed Viva Energy.

An OTR spokesman said: “Paying someone to publish false accounts and hiding behind fake identities to discredit OTR is dishonest and lacks integrity. It is extremely disappointing that competitors would resort to such unethical behaviour.”