Lacson: Filipinos don’t deserve ‘corrupt’ PhilHealth

MANILA, Philippines — “Filipinos don’t deserve a state health insurance that is so corrupt,”  Senator Panfilo Lacson said Wednesday.

Lacson took to Twitter again to lament the alleged massive corruption in the state-run Philippine  Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) that is now being investigated by the Senate and the House of Representatives.

“The President’s trust and confidence notwithstanding, Filipinos don’t deserve a state health insurance that is so corrupt, made possible by officials entrusted with mandatory monthly deductions from hard-earned salaries of ordinary employees,”  he said.

The senator did not elaborate but in an earlier post, he refreshed the “Filipinos’ short memory” by retweeting his statement last year about Health Secretary Francisco Duque III.

“Mr. President, your DOH Secretary/Philhealth chairman was Philhealth president in 2004 when P500M in OWWA funds was illegally used to buy Philhealth cards bearing ex-PGMA’s picture with the acronym (Greater Medical Access) and GMA para sa Masa, Para sa lahat.”

OWWA refers to the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration while ex-PGMA is former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

The same issue was revived during Tuesday’s hearing of the Senate.

In the hearing, PhilHealth Regional Vice President Dennis Adre claimed Duque ordered them in 2004 to distribute five million free insurance cards when the late Fernando Poe Jr was then leading by five million votes in a presidential poll.

Poe lost to Arroyo in the fraud-tainted 2004 presidential race.

Also during the same hearing, a whistleblower tagged Duque as a “godfather” of the so-called PhilHealth mafia that is allegedly pocketing millions of money from the agency’s funds.

But Duque, who faced the Senate probe Tuesday,  dismissed the allegations as “malicious” and baseless.

Also at the center of the congressional inquiries on the Philhealth mess include its president and chief executive officer, Ricardo Morales, and other officials, some of them were even tagged as part of the said mafia.

KGA