PAC TAKES MALAMA TO TASK

The Parliamentary Accounts Committee -PAC- has taken Ministry of Health Permanent Secretary for administration Kennedy Malama to task on why two officers at Ndola Teaching Hospital failed to bank 2.4 million kwacha for about 50 days.
Chavuma Member of Parliament Victor Lumayi wondered why the two officers kept such an amount for between 2 to 50 days without depositing it and were not charged.
But Dr. Malama regretted the occurrence saying the situation is embarrassing for his Ministry.
He said corrective measures have since been instituted and several people have been charged including the head of the province for failing to provide oversight role on management of funds.
And Dr. Alex Mukupe who was Senior Medical Superintendent at Ndola Teaching Hospital in 2017 when the anomaly happened said the money was not deposited because it was being used for emergencies such as buying diesel for the generator set during power outage and collection of blood.
Dr. Mukupe said the amount in question was not a block figure but money that came in from patients and was being used before being banked.
Meanwhile, Committee Chairperson Howard Kunda noted the need to engage administrators to perform their roles and allow medical doctors perform roles they are trained for of diagnosing patients.
He said this will help address administrative challenges as spending public resources before being banked is wrong.
But Dr. Malama defended the medical doctors saying some have performed better in administrative positions citing achievements scored by the Ministry of Health in reducing audit queries on unretired imprest and misappropriation of funds.
He also appealed to the Committee to help recommend for employment of more human resource officers in the Ministry to enhance service delivery.