MANILA – The Senate Blue Ribbon committee has recommended the filing of graft charges against former Health secretary and now Iloilo 1st District congresswoman Janette Garin and several others.
In 2015, P10.6 billion meant for senior citizens’ insurance premiums in the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) were used for 2016 election purposes, such as building barangay health stations, according to Sen. Richard Gordon, committee chairperson.
Garin was the secretary of the Department of Health (DOH) from 2015 up to the end of the term of then President Benigno Simeon Aquino III in June 2016.
Gordon announced his panel’s recommendation in a virtual press conference yesterday. His committee conducted an inquiry on PhilHealth fund releases prior to 2016, including the so-called WellMed dialysis scam last year.
Sought for her comment, Garin told the media yesterday she wanted to read Gordon’s committee report first.
“I will just review the statement of Senator Gordon, the documents and the issue. I will issue a statement tomorrow (today). I will also tackle this in tomorrow’s (today’s) press conference,” Garin said.
According to the Senate panel report, the “loss” of P10.6 billion “spent on uncompleted projects for political campaign purposes” stunted PhilHealth’s financial growth.
This budget diversion, added Gordon’s panel report, “derailed the march to efficient and reliable health insurance in this country.”
Also recommended for charging were former Department of Budget and Management secretary Florencio Abad and former PhilHealth chief Alex Padilla.
“The Office of the Ombudsman should conduct investigation as to the possibility of filing plunder charges against officers responsible in PhilHealth,” Gordon’s panel’s report stated.
On the last working day of public offices in 2015, according to Gordon, the Budget department released P9.39 billion which was supposed to be disbursed to PhilHealth but was given to projects requested by DOH, including P5.36 billion for the barangay health stations project.
Gordon’s panel report cited the Commission on Audit’s findings in 2017 that the project’s completion rate was all below 15 percent.
“What the committee noticed is the parallelism between Dengvaxia and the 2015 PhilHealth Senior Citizen Fund: both were intended to siphon funds from PhilHealth to finance the 2016 elections,” the panel said in its report.
The Senate panel also recommended the filing of a technical malversation charge and violation of Section 7 (1) of Republic Act 6713 or The Code of Conduct of Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees against Garin, Abad and Padilla./PN
