PhilHealth execs told: Don’t take House probe lightly
MANILA, Philippines — Officials of the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. were told not to take lightly the legislative investigation on the state insurer’s alleged anomalies as they could be cited for contempt.
During the House of Representatives inquiry, Cavite 7th District Rep. Jesus Crispin Remulla threatened to move PhilHealth Senior Vice President Rodolfo del Rosario to be held in contempt due to his absence at the hearing.
“I think this is not the first time Atty. Del Rosario has disobeyed the invitation of the House so I believe we have to either cite him [for] contempt or give him one more chance,” he said.
“He cannot take this committee lightly,” Remulla added.
He added that he could not see any reason why Del Rosario could attend the hearing, albeit virtually, “unless he is trying to evade us with impunity.”
It was later revealed that none of PhilHealth’s legal department was present at the hearing.
“Many of the problems we are now tackling and the investigation being conducted is because the legal department of PhilHealth was not able or did not do its job in investigating these anomalies early on,” Remulla said.
“Now they are trying to evade this committee, which gives me the reason to suspect that they may have been involved in the anomalies in PhilHealth itself and that they are trying to evade questions from this committee,” he added.
Del Rosario and members of the legal department of PhilHealth were given one hour to appear before the hearing, otherwise, lawmakers will issue a contempt motion.
A few minutes later, Del Rosario was able to appear online before the inquiry.
PhilHealth is currently under fire following claims of massive corruption within the agency.
Among allegations of corruption raised involved the procurement of alleged overpriced IT equipment; a supposedly questionable release of funds under the corporation’s Interim Reimbursement Mechanism (IRM); and the alleged manipulation of the corporation’s financial status.[ac]
