House panel to seek guidance on hold departure orders vs PhilHealth execs

A joint House panel on Tuesday approved a motion to seek guidance from the Department of Justice (DOJ) on the issuance of hold departure orders against  Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) regional and executive committee officials who were allegedly involved in supposed irregularities in the agency.

Aklan Representative Teodorico Haresco Jr. made the motion during the continuation of the inquiry of the House Committees on Public Accounts and on Good Government and Public Accountability on PhilHealth issues.

Haresco explained that his motion was prompted by a dream he had which was similar to a scene from the movie "The Godfather Part III."

"It appears in my dream na there was a capo di tutti, a capo di tutti that lasted for so many decades and he had these three mafias in the private sector and Civil Service Commission," he said.

He said that when the so-called "power rangers" of the House came in his dream, the supposed members of the mafias scrambled and escaped to other places, even abroad, and he was concerned that this would also happen in real life during the PhilHealth hearings.

"Because of the ongoing discussions, I move that the committee write the DOJ na ma-hold departure order ang mga opisyal na yan na nasa mafia sa panaginip ko na in charge of operations, in charge of auctioning," Haresco said.

House Committee on Public Accounts chair Mike Defensor said the motion was to study the imposition of a hold departure order on all regional and executive committee members of PhilHealth.

But before Defensor could act on it, Remulla chimed in to remind panel members to proceed "with caution" on the matter.

"Kung wala pang kaso na fina-file kasi, hindi yata appropriate and it might just unduly alarm people who may not be after all guilty of any offense," he said.

"So let's proceed with caution on this matter until we have proof or that we have reason to believe that there is really fraud in the actions of the officers. And let it not be a blanket order that we want to do, only for those that we suspect there to be fraud," he added.

Defensor then amended the motion to simply seeking guidance from DOJ on the issuance of a hold departure order. Hearing no objections, the motion was carried.

Resigned PhilHealth anti-fraud officer Thorsson Montes Keith earlier claimed that the PhilHealth "mafia," composed of the executive committee, stole some P15 billion through fraudulent schemes, including those involving the IRM.

PhilHealth, in a statement, denied the allegations.

Several PhilHealth officials, including president and CEO Ricardo Morales, have also signed a bank secrecy waiver allowing the Anti-Money Laundering Council to check their bank accounts.  — DVM, GMA News