Mahama's claim about NHIA investing in Treasury bill “outrageous” – NHIA

The National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) says the claim by the Presidential Candidate of the People’s National Convention (PNC), Dr. Edward Mahama that it invests service providers’ money in Treasury bill is “outrageous”.

According to the Authority, if that was the case, Parliament’s Public Account Committee (PAC) would have brought the issue to the attention of Ghanaians but this is not so.

Dr. Mahama who owns a hospital disclosed on JOYNEWS current affairs program, PULSE that corruption in the country is so bad to the point that service providers under the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) have not been paid for their services because management of the scheme has invested the money in Treasury bill.

“I have been reliably informed that some of the money have been put in account [into] Treasury bill [or] whatever to mature and provide money for some people”, he said.

Reacting to the issue on Joy News, Communications Manager of the NHIA, Selorm Adornu said it was unfortunate Dr. Mahama made such wild and unfortunate allegation.

According to him, this exposes a “Certain misunderstanding of the process because investment and the yields of our [NHIA] investment are a critical source of funding for the scheme”.

He explained the money allocated to the scheme at the beginning was more than the Authority requires to spend on its operation, hence, the decision to invest the surplus money lying in the account. This is different from the money earmarked for service providers, he said.

“The scheme is funded by a number of sources and if you have such a good investment management and your resources are yielding money, I don’t think anybody will say that they don’t like a lot of money”, he said.

Mr. Adornu also debunked Dr. Mahama’s claim that his hospital has pulled out of the NHIS due to non-release of funds.

“If Dr. Mahama will be frank with you, he will tell you that is not true”, he said.

Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com | Austin Brako-Powers | Email: [email protected]