{"id":267343,"date":"2020-09-02T00:46:45","date_gmt":"2020-09-02T04:46:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=267343"},"modified":"2020-09-02T00:46:45","modified_gmt":"2020-09-02T04:46:45","slug":"duterte-to-await-task-forces-findings-on-philhealth-woes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/09\/02\/duterte-to-await-task-forces-findings-on-philhealth-woes\/","title":{"rendered":"Duterte to await task force\u2019s findings on PhilHealth woes"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
FILE: President Rodrigo Roa Duterte talks to the people after holding a meeting with the Inter-Agency Task Force on the Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) core members at the Malago Clubhouse in Malaca\u00f1ang on August 2, 2020. KING RODRIGUEZ\/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte would rely on the findings of Task Force PhilHealth on the allegations of unabated and widespread corruption in the state-run insurer, Malaca\u00f1ang said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor now, the President would defer to the findings of the task force,\u201d Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said in an interview with CNN Philippines\u2019 The Source. \u201cThe President will have to await the formal findings of his own task force.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roque made the statement after the Senate Committee of the Whole recommended on Tuesday the filing of criminal charges against embattled Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, resigned PhilHealth chief Ricardo Morales, and several former and incumbent PhilHealth officials over the supposedly \u201cimproper and illegal implementation\u201d of the interim reimbursement mechanism (IRM).<\/p>\n

The Senate committee said Duque, Morales, and some senior vice presidents of PhilHealth should be slapped with criminal and administrative cases for their alleged involvement in the \u201cshady\u201d implementation of the IRM.<\/p>\n

The IRM is an advanced payment program that allows PhilHealth to give health care institutions cash in advance to respond to unanticipated events, such as natural disasters and calamities.<\/p>\n

Roque said the Senate\u2019s recommendation is \u201calways welcome.\u201d<\/p>\n

He, however, said Task Force PhilHealth would come up with better recommendations than the ones made by the Senate.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you would expect that the evaluation of evidence and appreciation of evidence would be, should I say, far more in-depth than the Senate investigation. That\u2019s why we are awaiting the findings of the task force,\u201d Roque said.<\/p>\n

The task force, created by Duterte on August 7 and led by the Department of Justice, was directed to investigate the supposed rampant corruption in PhilHealth.<\/p>\n

Other members of the task force are the Office of the Ombudsman, Commission on Audit, Civil Service Commission, the Office of the Executive Secretary, the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission, and the Office of the Special Assistant to the President.<\/p>\n

Roque expressed confidence that the task force would consider the Senate\u2019s recommendation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the task force itself will evaluate the findings of the Senate. I\u2019m almost sure that the Senate has transmitted all the evidence it has gathered in the course of its investigation. Whether or not the task force will agree with the conclusion, I leave it to the task force,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Roque said he was also optimistic that it would ensure that individuals behind the widespread corruption in PhilHealth would be held accountable for their acts.<\/p>\n

The task force, he said, only has until September 14 to finish the investigation on PhilHealth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think within the month of September, the President would like to see their findings,\u201d Roque said. \u201cAs I said, let\u2019s await the recommendations of the task force. If the task force has a similar recommendation as the Senate, so be it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte would rely on the findings of Task Force PhilHealth on the allegations of unabated and widespread …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":263806,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-267343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-ruth-abbey-gita-carlos","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=267343"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":267344,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267343\/revisions\/267344"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=267343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=267343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=267343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}