I'm less cynical than you are about the parent comment, largely because I'm watching the same scenario unfold within my own company.

We're on year two of the million-dollar team turning out nothing. I'm in a different department, but my position means I liaise with lots of different people throughout the organization, so I also know that a single dev in a third department is half-way through solving the problem because a ultra-high-level manager doesn't want to wait anymore and will use it as an excuse to can the other team and that department's director.

And this was of course very maintainable, up to todays standards, easy to onboard new hires in, not falling apart in edge cases that weren't part of the demo, code that was audited by multiple developers, it didn't make any shortcuts in terms of security, etc. etc. etc.

Unless you've seen the person's codebase, it's uncharitable for you to assume that it's deficient, perhaps based on your own experiences.

If this scenario can happen in two companies, it might be more common that any of us realize.