 Facing growing criticism, Jan Coene was forced to resign from both Picanol and Belgacom in October 2004.He accepted to reimburse ten million euros to Picanol (which because of the height of the sums reserved for Jan Coene had become financially unhealthy) but kept 12 million.The affair became a political issue in Belgium and a bill was introduced in Parliament (the "Picanol law") to force big companies to publish the remuneration of their upper management personnel.