**Exhibit 31.1**

 

**CERTIFICATIONS**

 

In connection with the Annual Report on Form 10-K of Comdial Corporation (the “Company”) for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2003 as filed with theSecurities and Exchange Commission on the date hereof, I, Neil P. Lichtman, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Company, certify, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 1350, as adopted pursuant to § 302 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, that:

 

(1) I have reviewed this Annual Report on Form 10-K ofComdial Corporation; 

 

(2) Based on my knowledge, this reportdoes not contain any untrue statement of a material fact or omit to state a material fact necessary to make the statements made, in light of the circumstances under which such statements were made, not misleading with respect to the period coveredby this report; 

 

(3) Based on my knowledge, the financialstatements, and other financial information included in this report, fairly present in all material respects the financial condition, results of operations and cash flows of the Company as of, and for, the periods presented in this report;

 

(4) The Company’s other certifying officer and I areresponsible for establishing and maintaining disclosure controls and procedures (as defined in Exchange Act Rules 13a-15(e) and 15d-15(e)) and internal control over financial reporting (as defined in Exchange Act Rules 13a-15(f) and 15d-15(f)) forthe Company and have: 

 

(a) Designed suchdisclosure controls and procedures, or caused such disclosure controls and procedures to be designed under our supervision, to ensure that material information relating to the Company, including its consolidated subsidiaries, is made known to us byothers within those entities, particularly during the period in which this report is being prepared; 

 

(b) Designed such internal control over financial reporting, or caused such internal control over financial reporting to be designed underour supervision, to provide reasonable assurance regarding the reliability of financial reporting and the preparation of financial statements for external purposes in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles; 

 

(c) Evaluated the effectiveness of the Company’sdisclosure controls and procedures and presented in this report our conclusions about the effectiveness of the disclosure controls and procedures, as of the end of the period covered by this report based on such evaluation; and 

 

(d) Disclosed in this report any change in theCompany’s internal control over financial reporting that occurred during the Company’s most recent fiscal quarter (the Company’s fourth fiscal quarter in the case of an annual report) that has materially affected, or is reasonablylikely to materially affect, the Company’s internal control over financial reporting; and 

 

(5) The Company’s other certifying officer and I have disclosed, based on our most recent evaluation of internal control over financial reporting, to the Company’s auditors and the audit committee of theCompany’s board of directors (or persons performing the equivalent functions): 

 

(a) All significant deficiencies and material weaknesses in the design or operation of internal control over financial reporting which arereasonably likely to adversely affect the Company’s ability to record, process, summarize and report financial information; and 

 

(b) Any fraud, whether or not material, that involves management or other employees who have a significant role in the Company’sinternal control over financial reporting. 

 

Date: March 30, 2004