BY JEFFREY DAMICOG
Newly appointed Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) President and Chief Executive Officer Dante Gierran immediately buckled down to work barely a day after being named as head of the state health insurer.
The retired National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) chief said he is forming a management committee composed of five persons that will look deeper into several anomalous transactions.
“I will be creating my own management committee,” he said during a CNN Philippines interview on Tuesday.
Gierran, however, declined to name the members of his team.
He replaced Ricardo Morales who tendered his resignation last Aug. 26 amid corruption allegations including the procurement of alleged overpriced IT equipment and the alleged manipulation of the corporation’s financial records.
The agency is also under investigation due to alleged questionable release of funds under the corporation’s Interim Reimbursement Mechanism (IRM).
“I am not from the PhilHealth so I do not know what PhilHealth is. So with that I will start getting inside PhilHealth,” Gierran explained.
Aside from the management committee, Gierran said he will “hire or re-hire 125 special investigators to be conducting investigation on these disbursements made by PhilHealth.”
Though Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra and several senators are one in saying that Gierran is cut out for the job, the former NBI chief expressed reservation as he considers Philhealth a “snake pit”.
“So I have to be careful and one way to be careful is to choose the right people to be with me,” said Gierran who revealed he did not apply for the position and was only asked by Sen. Christopher “Bong” Go and Presidential Management Staff (PMS) Undersecretary Jesus Melchor Quitain.
Gierran also revealed that President Duterte intends to have a massive revamp “in two to three days from today and put to jail those who committed fraud. (Jeffrey Damicog)
“Former NBI Director Gierran’s legal and accounting background, his well-known investigative skills, administrative abilities, and fiscal prudence make him fit for the PhilHealth top position, and equip him well to pursue the cleansing process and reformation at PhilHealth to their logical conclusion,” Guevarra said of Gierran.
Gierran, who is both a lawyer and certified public accountant, became NBI director in 2016 at the appointment of the President and retired from service on his 65th birthday last Feb. 22.
The NBI is currently under the leadership of Officer-In-Charge Director Eric Distor.
Senate President Vicente Sotto III, on the other hand, said Gierran was a “very good choice” to lead the state insurer amid persistent claims of corruption and funds mismanagement.
“Director Gierran is a very good choice as Philhealth chief. Aside from a clean record, he has investigative skills that can crack the whip in ferreting out anomalies in the agency,” Sotto said in a text message to reporters.
Senator Panfilo Lacson said he also does not question Gierran’s integrity due to his background in leading the NBI. He, however, said he hopes that the new PhilHealth chief will not be manipulated by unscrupulous people surrounding the corporation.
“Walang kontrobersya na hinarap ang NBI, maayos ang pamamalakad sa NBI nang siya ang director. On that note, wala tayong masabi na kinasangkutan niyang kontrobersya (The NBI did not figure in any controversy, he led the NBI well when he was its director. On that note, we cannot cite any controversy that he was involved in),” Lacson said in an interview with ABS-CBN’s Teleradyo.
“Pangalawa I just hope na hindi siya ma-manipulate ng mga tao inside and outside of PhilHealth. Alam naman natin na for the longest time, nauuubos ang pera ng PhilHealth sa anomalya at kalokohan (Second, I just hope that he will not be manipulated by people inside and outside of PhilHealth. We know that for the longest time, the funds of PhilHealth are depleting because of anomalies and fraud),” he said.
“I hope and I mean it – that PhilHealth will not be Dante’s Inferno,” Lacson also said of Gierran in a tweet Monday night.
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On the President Duterte’s order to fire all PhilHealth regional vice presidents, Lacson said this might not be easy to implement.
“Removing all the RVP’s of PhilHealth may be easier ordered than implemented considering that a number of them are protected by the civil service law. This is not to mention that it is unjust and unfair to those who are not involved in shenanigans in PhilHealth much less being accused of any crime or facing administrative cases,” Lacson opined.
Senator Grace Poe, for her part, said she hopes for “drastic” reforms in the PhilHealth under Gierran’s leadership.
“Our people expect no less than a person of unassailable integrity and competence at the helm of PhilHealth to implement drastic institutional reforms,” Poe said in a statement.
“The job at hand is tough. However, it is critical in safeguarding not just the health but the wealth of the Filipino people,” she added.
Poe said the reshuffle in the leadership, however, “should not absolve those who will be found remiss in their obligations, which have brought the PhilHealth in its current ailing state.”
“Dapat pa ring habulin at parusahan ang mga corrupt at nagpabaya sa tungkulin. Ang pagnanakaw sa kaban ng bayan ay pagkakait sa ating mga kababayan ng kanilang karapatan sa maayos na serbisyong pangkalusugan (The government should still go after and penalize those corrupt and negligent of their responsibilities. Stealing from the people’s coffers equate to depriving of their right for proper health services),” she maintained.
Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri, meanwhile, said expressed optimism that the former will be able to track down members of the so-called “mafia” in the PhilHealth.
“I believe Gierran will be able to untangle the mafia web inside PhilHealth and stop the nefarious shenanigans happening within. He must move swiftly to stop all the leakages and unnecessary loss of the people’s money in the state insurance agency,” he said.
He said he also lauds President Duterte’s order to sack and reorganize all PhilHealth regional vice presidents.
“A top to bottom revamp is needed to end the mafia that is controlling all the transactions within the State Health Insurance agency. They should continue as well the revamp to middle management and field managers who had shown collusion with the mafia by their none action of cases filed against erring and fraudulent hospitals and clinics by PhilHealth’s anti-fraud division,” he said.
“All that could be easily traced as there is clear pattern of protection for ‘colluding’ institutions that give pay-offs and the continued harassment, as well as none assistance to those who do not ‘cooperate’,” Zubiri continued.
Sen. Imee Marcos also vouched for Gierran’s integrity.
“With his unique investigative background, I hope he can finally get to the bottom of the quagmire that is Philhealth,” Marcos said in a separate statement.
“The presidents order to remove reg[iona]l directors is no doubt based on the task force findings, [and] from the Senate’s own investigations. Certainly not all regions were equal — some were far more equal than others! I think the legal & money trails should further b cleared at the reg[iona]l level, where upcasing, outright payment of fraudulent claims, wholesale fakery of membership, [and] other scams often began,” she added.
