What Parirenyatwa said about the doctors and medical aid societies debacle- Full debate in Parliament

HON. HOLDER: I did not hear the Minister respond to my questions. First of all, my question was is it true that people with PSMAS were not being accepted at Parirenyatwa Hospital? The second one was on whether our remunerations were being paid to the relevant medical societies. Were they getting the money from where we get it from?

PARIRENYATWA: Hon. Holder, it is true that at one stage Parirenyatwa was owed over a million dollars by PSMAS and was not in a position to take some. We are now saying to Parirenyatwa, all cards for medical aid for our patients should be accepted and then other means of getting that money back should be found.

*Hon. Muzondiwa, you talked about the issue of Cuthbert Dube and that I also received some money from him as well. It is an important matter to me and it actually hurt me quite a lot and for a time, I actually withdrew into myself because it is not true that I did that – [AN. HON. MEMBER: Inaudible interjections.] – Aah, mira ka ndikutaurire. The truth of the matter is that PSMAS has been having relationships with doctors for a long time and with me for a very long time. I have been in practice since 1984, working with medical aid societies. We have developed a very good relationship with some of them. One of the things that have happened is that when you are working with medical aid societies and they do not pay you for five months, you get quite a lot of problems and this is what happened.

My surgery went and said can we have this payment done. The medical aid service said yes, we will pay. They did not pay and as you do that you are accumulating your own debts. We then pleaded with them to pay. When they paid, we then said, it is like they have been having your money for so long and then we said is it allowed also to have an advance payment – [HON.D. SIBANDA: Vamwe vasiri kuwana, as the Minister responsible?] – So, what then happened and it is very professional routine practice – [HON. MEMBERS: Inaudible interjections.] – No, I think it is good that we discussed but everything was done professionally with appropriate code of ethics. There was nothing out of form and it was all reconciled properly.

What I find Mr. Speaker Sir is that sometimes there is no understanding of the workings between doctors and insurance companies – [HON. D. SIBANDA: Between the Minister and insurance companies.] – So, in short everything was done very professionally and I can assure you that everything was signed up. There was no – and everything was paid as scheduled. In fact, I do not think I need to explain any further. Everything was done and you can ask the medical society itself. Everything was done accordingly.

HON. CROSS: This matter will be the subject of a Public Hearing next week between the Committees of Public Accounts and Health and the Minister will be summoned to those Committees to explain his position. I think today is not a suitable subject for this platform.

THE TEMPORARY SPEAKER (HON. MARUMAHOKO): I thought as much that this is not the platform for that question.

PARIRENYATWA: The other question that has been asked is on the issue of price fixing, providers and insurances to investigate. This issue will be addressed in our Bill. We will be addressing the issue of conflict of interest, price fixing and auditing. This will be part of the issues that will be discussed.

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