‘Disrespectful’ Hospital CEO ousted from PAC meeting

…as Finance Director disavows finance responsibility

A ‘disrespectful’ Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GHPC), Allan Johnson was upbraided by Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Chairman Irfaan Ali on Monday and was subsequently asked to leave the hearing.

Johnson was at the time being grilled, along with Finance Officer Ronald Charles, by Ali and colleague People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Member of Parliament, Bishop Juan Edghill, but both men were woefully ill-prepared when questioned about expenditure by the entity.
The matter came to a head when the MP questioned a failure to submit financial statements for 2015 in breach of the Public Corporation Act by GPHC.
Questions were left unanswered and a strange state of affairs was also unearthed as the ‘Finance Director’ seemed unaware he was in fact Finance Director since another person also serves in the capacity.
After the men failed on numerous occasions to provide specific answers on spending undertaken by the GPHC in 2015, Ali intervened and brought the proceedings to a close before ousting Johnson.
The PAC Chairman was adamant the GPHC’s CEO, “is trying to frustrate the PAC, I believe the CEO, you, you are disrespectful…you came here before you know who are the relevant offices that need to be before PAC.”
According to Ali, “this behaviour would not be tolerated; I will not allow you to waste the PAC time…we are going to ask you to leave this morning and we are going to get back to you and we hope you come back prepared the next time.”
He used the occasion to draw to Johnson’s attention the fact the public was an integral stakeholder in the process. That eventually led to an informal back-and-forth exchange between MP Edghill who scolded the Hospital CEO saying “behave like a big man…this is nonsense…you believe I ain’t got nothing to do when Monday mornings come.”

Ali had earlier clashed with CEO Johnson over the failure of the Corporation to submit its financial statements for 2015 and 2016 and questioned what sanctions would be put in place against the technical or financial officers responsible.
Johnson told PAC, “We do have a plan to ensure that it gets done.”
Asked specifically about the plan, and if any action was taken, Johnson answered in the negative, prompting the PAC Chair to ask, “As CEO you are satisfied with this?” which was met with a long pause.
An angered PAC Chair, further pressing the Hospital CEO on what actions would be taken over the failure of the GPHC to keep the legal requirements of the Public Corporations Act said, “I am going to write the Finance Director – sitting next to him – for him to give me, um, for him to state why it was not done and then proceed from there.”
It was pointed out by Edghill  that the breaches were unearthed in audit findings and known to the technical officers for several months and “he is going to come to PAC this morning to tell us, having had to answer a question, that he is now going to write the Finance Director to find out why this didn’t happen.”
Edghill, a former junior Finance Minister under the previous PPP/C Administration, also used the opportunity during the brief session to question how much funds GPHC would hold in its accounts at the end of the year rather than returning the money to the Consolidated Fund.
An assurance was given that the monies were returned, but when asked for some sort of documentation to corroborate claims that the monies were in fact returned to the treasury, the hospital team again found itself at loggerheads with the members of the parliamentary committee.
Johnson then asked for time to provide that information and was given until today by PAC Chairman Ali.
Edghill then sought to query how exactly the GPHC was closing its books at the end of the year if there was not documentation, but by this time the PAC Chairman observed that the GPHC CEO was, in fact, misleading the parliamentary committee.
According to Ali, based on information available to the Committee, 2016 funds had not been returned to the Consolidated Fund – this despite the faithful assurance to the contrary a few minutes earlier.
This conundrum led to a more revealing line of questioning since Johnson at this time asked that questions be directed to the Hospital’s Finance Director.
The PAC Chairman reminded Finance Director Charles of the CEO’s assertion of the GPHC returning all monies to the treasury at the end of the year to which he responded “let me clarify.”
He told the Committee all remaining monies from 2015 would have been returned to Government, but with regard to 2016, “as far as I am aware….”; there were a noticeably long pause, observed by the PAC Chairman, before the Finance Director conceded there might still be some money outstanding for 2016 that may have to be returned to the treasury, but this needed to be clarified.
The PAC Chairman objected to the response coming from the Finance Director of the Hospital and asked, “Are you the Finance Director, sir?”
Charles’ bizarre response – “not for the Finance per se” – left committee members visibly flabbergasted.
Ali’s immediate response was to question what precisely he was Finance Director of at GPHC and it was at this point the Committee heard that there were in fact two Finance Directors functioning at the GPHC.The Committee heard that the previous functionary had been relieved of his duties, creating a vacancy for which Charles was appointed Finance Director.
Johnson told the Committee, “The last Board brought back (name given) as director and therefore, Mr Charles, was shifted to procurement.”
The PAC Chair replied, “I am (now) confused about what is going on here, when you introduced Mr Charles to the PAC today you said that he is the Finance Director; Mr Charles did not object to the introduction.”
Johnson reaffirmed that Charles was in fact the Finance Director, prompting Ali to question “are you paid as the Finance Director of the Georgetown Hospital,” to which Charles responded: “Yes, I am.”
An incensed Committee Chairman by this point declared to the Hospital CEO, “this place is in total confusion, you don’t even know who your Finance Director is…the Finance Director is saying he is not in charge of finances.”
Having asserted his position before PAC as being the Finance Director of the GPHC, Charles told Committee Members he should be aware of the state of the finances of the entity, but at the time he was not fully aware.
Johnson at this point in time attempted to explain away Charles’s presence before the PAC since the other Finance Director had reported sick two days earlier.
By the end of the PAC session, MP Edghill posited that the postulations on the part of the Hospital CEO could have been very deliberate, “coming to PAC this morning with one member of staff who is not capable and in possession of all of the information”.