Ex-PhilHealth chief Padilla on fund diversion: Brazen lie, baseless

Former Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) president and CEO Alexander Padilla on Tuesday denied allegations that he diverted billions of PhilHealth funds, saying that no such funds existed in the first place.

“This allegation is a brazen lie and has no basis whatsoever,” Padilla said.

“This issue was not even part of that being investigated by the Senate. I was never asked to appear, or say something on the issue, and rightly so because there was no such fund to begin with,” he added.

Earlier, the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee recommended the filing of criminal charges against Padilla, former Health Secretary Janette Garin, and former Budget Secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad for allegedly diverting P10.6 billion to construct barangay health centers and procure dental trucks.

“[T]here is no such fund that was diverted because there was no fund to begin with. This is adequately explained by former DBM Secretary Butch Abad and confirmed by then Secretary DBM Ben Diokno as well,” Padilla said in a message to GMA News Online.

Abad has also denied the existence of the funds. The former secretary said that the P10.6 billion were not included in the 2015 General Appropriations Act.

According to Padilla, the barangay health centers program was the Department of Health’s project alone.

“Relative with the BHC program, PhilHealth has also nothing to do with it. That was a program bidded out, procured, implemented, and supervised by DOH alone using their funds. PhilHealth is in no business of funding infrastractures or projects of DOH,” he said.

In 2018, Garin also denied allegations that she requested the Department of Budget and Management to divert the funds which were allocated for the expanded Senior Citizens Act. —LDF, GMA News