Anti-Corruption Unit Reports on Health Sector Bribe Case
The government’s Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) on Tuesday delivered its latest report on its review of allegations of massive bribe taking inside the Health Ministry leveled by the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria in November. Officials on Wednesday were mum about the review, however, and about how they planned to handle a request from the Global Fund to pay back hundreds of thousands of dollars that were siphoned off by corrupt officials. After a yearslong audit of its past grants to Cambodia, the Global Fund released a detailed report in November accusing health officials—who have since left their jobs—of taking more than $400,000 in bribes to secure contracts for overseas mosquito net suppliers. The NGO Medicam was also found to have overcharged the Global Fund by nearly $21,000. … In a December 9 letter to Health Minister Mam Bun Heng, the Global Fund asked the ministry and Medicam to repay a combined $473,000 within 30 days or risk losing out on all—or a portion of—a pending $106 million in Global Fund grants to the country. … The $106 million the Global Fund is threatening to withhold would have significant consequences across the country’s severely under-resourced health sector.
Khy Sovuthy and Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/anti-corruption-unit-reports-on-health-sector-bribe-case-49863/
