MANILA – Newly-appointed Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) president and CEO Dante Gierran vowed to restore the public’s trust and confidence in the state insurer.
Gierran, a former National Bureau of Investigation director, admitted that it was a tough task for him to take over the PhilHealth from his predecessor Ricardo Morales but he will not back down.
“I did not apply for the position because I know it’s a very tough job,” Gierran said during President Rodrigo Duterte’s public address on Monday night. “I have been listening to the hearings. I was aghast to the sorry state of PhilHealth. Corruption, here and there.”
“I am one who will not back out from a mission. I know it’s a huge mission,” he added. “All I have to do is to restore the trust and the confidence of the people to PhilHealth, equivalent to restoring the trust and confidence of the people to the government.”
“I have to strike a balance, between improving the service of PhilHealth to the people and addressing the perennial issues of deeply rooted corruption in PhilHealth,” he further said.
Gierran was the first NBI director appointed by Duterte after he won the 2016 presidential elections. The 65-year-old official stepped down in February for his mandatory retirement. Prior to his four year-stint as director, he was the NBI regional director for the Davao Region.
Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque, meanwhile, said President Duterte’s marching order to Gierran was a reshuffle of regional vice presidents of the embattled state insurer.
Whistleblower Thorsson Montes Keith, former PhilHealth anti-fraud legal officer, has revealed that members of the PhilHealth executive committee pocketed some P15 billion in funds through several fraudulent schemes. PhilHealth denied the allegation./PN
