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THE Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) announced that it would hand over the payment to the Philippine Red Cross on Monday, October 26, when Malacanang urged the humanitarian organization to resume testing for the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) in the country.
This was developed as the Commissions of Public Accounts and Good Governance and Public Responsibility of the House of Representatives, in a draft report, recommended the presentation of charges against the Secretary of Health Francisco Duque 3 and the former president and CEO of PhilHealth Ricardo Morales, among others, for alleged corruption. .
Representative Michael Defensor, chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said Friday that the report will be finalized at the next joint hearing next week.
The release of the payment to PRC comes as the Department of Justice (DoJ) issued a legal opinion on Friday on the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) signed between PhilHealth and the humanitarian organization that, according to the DoJ, was not covered by the Law of Republic 9184 or the Public Procurement Law.
PhilHealth Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Dante Gierran requested legal opinion on the MoA that the previous administration signed with the People’s Republic of China.
Gierran, the former director of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) whom President Rodrigo Duterte appointed to replace Morales, said the MoA should follow RA 9184.
Gierran said the People’s Republic of China was chosen under an “emergency procurement tender” rather than going through a competitive tender required in a regular procurement under the law.
Gierran said, however, that even if the process was “relaxed” into an emergency bid, “there are still requirements that must be met.”
Gierran said his lawyers discovered that the Ministry of Agriculture did not follow the procurement law due to the lack of publication on the Government Procurement Board (GPPB) and the PhilHealth website.
He held that whatever the opinion, PhilHealth will pay its obligations to PRC.
PhilHealth said the money would be released once the People’s Republic of China completes filing its billing requirements according to the Audit Commission rules.
The payment, PhilHealth said, would allow the Red Cross “to immediately resume its testing of swab samples from the affected sectors that PhilHealth pays for.”
Palace appeal
Earlier on Friday, Roque appealed to the People’s Republic of China after its president, Senator Richard Gordon, rejected the government’s proposal to pay off half of PhilHealth’s P930 million debt.
Roque reiterated that the People’s Republic of China should resume its Covid-19 tests as the president had agreed to pay PhilHealth’s debt.
Roque also appealed to Filipino Overseas Workers (OFW) and Filipinos Overseas (OF) “for patience and understanding as we resolve this matter as soon as possible.”
Roque said that as a temporary measure, “we have already asked government and private laboratories to assist our OFW and OF in their (r) RT-PCR tests.”
rRT-PCR is a real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction or swab test.
House preliminary report
At a virtual press conference on Friday, Defensor said the draft report still needs to be “discussed, debated and amended if necessary.”
Defender said Duque was included, as chairman of the PhilHealth Board, for “reversing” an order from the Court of Appeals suspending Perpetuo Socorro Hospital in Cebu for extending the confinement period of a patient that was credited to the state insurer. Instead, PhilHealth imposed a fine of P100,000.
Defender also said there had been a “clear violation” regarding cash advances made to hospitals under the Interim Reimbursement Mechanism (IRM), which was approved by the PhilHealth board under Duque.
Defensor said Morales’ inclusion was as a member of the executive committee, which made the recommendations and delivered the funds.
“So all of those actions were covered in this report, and of course all of those actions will be covered by one particular violation,” he said.
Defender said that among the cases that the House of Representatives committees recommended shelving were violations of the law against corruption and corruption.
Defender said he would also want to focus on “just one case, the problem we see,” after which charges will be filed “immediately.”
Asked for their reaction, PhilHealth said, in a statement, that it would await the official report of the House committees and that it would “continue to cooperate with the investigating authorities” to extract “only the truth to exonerate the innocent and the guilty of suffering all the force of the law ”. KEITH CALAYAG, RED MENDOZA
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