Morales admits PhilHealth's anti-fraud operation inadequate, whistleblowing policy weak

The Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) adopted a policy to encourage reporting corruption allegations, but it remains weak and inadequate for the meantime, its top official said Tuesday.

In a Senate hearing, PhilHealth president and chief executive officer Ricardo Morales said the agency implemented a new information system which failed due to the lack of funding and manpower.

"We adopted a whistleblower policy that hopefully would encourage whistleblowers, but again, for an organization, we transact 32,000 claims a day. Medyo weak tsaka inadequate 'yung whistleblowing," he said.

Morales also noted that with the number of claims received by the agency, its anti-fraud mechanism remains inadequate even after 128 employees were hired last year for such efforts.

"It's still a drop in the bucket so inadequate po ang anti-fraud mechanism ng PhilHealth for the size of its operation," he said.

PhilHealth is under congressional scrutiny after three of its officials resigned just last month over alleged corrupt practices in the agency.

One of them, former anti-fraud legal officer Thorrsson Montes Keith said during the hearing that a "mafia" within the corporation has pocketed some P15 billion from fraud.

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque, Jr. said PhilHealth officials are under investigation over the agency's alleged overpriced purchase of an information technology system worth over P2 billion.

Roque said the investigation will be headed by Undersecretary Jesus Melchor Quitain of the Office of the Special Assistant to the President. --KBK, GMA News