Unpreparedness gets GPHC CEO, Financial Director thrown out of PAC

May 30, 2017 News

Two officials from the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) were yesterday asked to leave the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) meeting after their responses were deemed as inadequate in answering questions related to the organization.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Allan Johnson and the institution’s Finance Director Ronald Charles were being questioned in parliament chambers as to the reason for the hospital not submitting financial statements for 2015 and 2016.
In what was a feisty PAC meeting yesterday, Chairman Irfaan Ali said the medical institution was in breach of the Public Corporation Act, which requires that financial statements be submitted six months after the close of the financial period.
At this point, CEO Johnson gave a commitment that the 2015 statement will be submitted by the end of September this year. In relation to 2016, Johnson said that as far as he was aware that statement has been submitted.
Ali objected to this and informed Johnson that based on the information he has from the Auditor General, no such statement was submitted. The chairman asked that the necessary documentation be provided to confirm that this was indeed done.
Ali further enquired from the CEO what action was taken against the responsible officer who should have provided the 2015 statement, since more than a year has elapsed and the statement is still not forthcoming.
To Ali’s obvious annoyance, Johnson said that nothing was done, and asked that his Finance Director (Charles) clarify the issue before the PAC. Charles without giving specific details told the committee that “there is a plan in place”.
Rhetorically the chairman asked Charles if he is the Finance Director, to which he replied “I should be”. Further, he said that he is the finance director, but not for finance.
Ali then turned his attention to the CEO Johnson and enquired how many Finance Directors the corporation has, since Charles was introduced to PAC as the hospital’s Finance Director. Johnson explained that there is another director who was ill and could not attend the session.
At this point, PAC member Juan Edghill asked how the hospital received subsequent subventions, since there was un-spent money from the two previous years that was not returned to the consolidated fund.
Edghill said that he found the responses given by the two officials as inadequate and wasting the PAC’s time and suggested that the inadequate responses and the casual manner in which the matter was being treated could not continue.
Edghill said that he suspects that the officials were behaving in such a manner since they were given instructions from higher officials.
This suggestion did not sit well with CEO Johnson, who as he was leaving the chamber asked Edghill “who gave me instructions?” Johnson reminded Edghill that he was an adult and was not taking instructions from anyone.
Edghill did not find favour with the fact that Johnson was having a dialogue with him as he was leaving the chamber and told the CEO he is rude and should hang his head in shame at what is going on.
The GPHC will return to PAC when all the facts have been gathered on the non-submission of the financial statements.

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