FRAUD:  Staff threatens to ground activities in LUTH over wrong narrative in Pay Slip

By: James Bwala

TROUBLE brewing at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH as staff are threatening to shut down the hospital in protest over what they described as fraudulent deductions in their monthly pay by Professor Chris Bode led management in the name of ‘Hospital Bills’ as narrated in their pay slips.

It could be recalled that, Staff of LUTH had last month alleged fraud in the hospital pointing at the Chief Medical Director, Professor Chris Bode as partaking in the ongoing duplicitous in collaboration with some staff of the Accountant General office, where money said to have been paid wrongly to staff accounts were being deducted and instead of the amount to go back to its original source, the money is being diverted into LUTH accounts and subsequently being retrieved from the account through dubious means for self-help.

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A staff of the institution informed NEWSng that the CMD and some of his cronies in the hospital are now securing the money to themselves through unnecessary purchases. “LUTH has started spending the money. The CMD just bought Toyota Hilux at the sum of 40 million naira without budget for it. He is spending money on Hilux that will be piloting him to his home town in Ejigbo, Osun state on a weekly basis at the expense of the hospital fund.

“We are majorly concerned before we the union members ground the hospital activities. We are appealing to the higher authority to direct LUTH to pay the money back to the IPPIS TSA Account so that ASUU will have access to more funds in order for students to resume back to their schools.” He said.

According to LUTH staff, they would have understood if the management told them that they are reconciling the figures and thereafter, will transfer it to the consolidated revenue account. “But the CMD will not do that because he is always in the habit of grandstanding and he likes money laundry a lot.”

The staff said they were paid double salary in December 2014 and IPPIS deducted the money from the source directly in January and February 2015 salary. “Our problem is that, why is the management doing this? Why pay it into a LUTH account? We want all the funds to be paid back to the IPPIS TSA account, not the LUTH TSA account. The money presently in the LUTH account should be refunded back to the IPPIS account.

“They are now using the narratives “Hospital Bills” in the pay slip and going back to withdraw money from the LUTH account. If that money is in the IPPIS TSA account, they cannot remove it for whatever reason. We know what is happening in the hospital that is why we want the anti-graft agencies to also come in.

“If they are saying “Hospital Bills” the question I want to ask is that am I a patient in the ward? Or, do I have a patient on the ward?  Why LUTH hospital bill instead of fund wrongly paid into my account and deducted” The staff asked.

NEWSng  however, spoke with some of the top management including the Board Chairman and member at LUTH, who described claims by staff as unfortunate, adding that they  were however not privy to what is happening at LUTH concerning recent agitations by staff.

Speaking to LUTH PRO Ms Lola Fakeye told NEWSng on phone that they have not received complaints either verbally or in writing suggesting any shortchange or what the staff are claiming to have been happening with their payment advice letter.

“All I know is that there was no official complaint to the management regarding this. However, I know that there was a circular to that effect.” She said,

Speaking to Director of Administration, Mr. Babajide Grillo; his advice is that staff should write to the management to express their concerns as according to him he has not received a complaint over the deduction, which suggests any action the staff might want to take against the narration in their pay slip.

“They should see the Head of Finance and account to discuss such an issue, I think it is better. I spoke with the Head of Finance about this and he told me they can approach him for further explanation if they are not satisfied with the narration and the soaring point of argument which is about the ‘Hospital bill’ as claimed. They should also write to me”. He added.

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Also speaking, a member of the board at LUTH told NEWSng that he was only hearing reports filtering about three days ago. According to him, the Board was at LUTH about ten days ago for promotion interviews but nobody approached them to complain about happenings in the hospital.

While reacting, Chairman of the Board Alhaji Isa Bello Sali told NEWSng that these are issues relating to the management of the hospital. Adding that as Board their roles are policy making and supervisory. He however noted that he was hearing the complaints for the first time.

“I advise that if there are such issues, the staff can write to us through the management and indeed state their worries. If you have not called I probably would not have heard that there are issues at LUTH. “The Chairman said.

Speaking to staff complainants, they told NEWSng that it is not natural as it seems to approach the management to air their complaint for fear of witch-hunt, but that when they decided to go on strike over these issues they will do that through their union.

“We feel secure to approach the media. They can victimize us if we write to them especially under the Chris Bode administration. All these people you have talked to know that it is not possible to approach the management or write to them as individuals but we will meet with our union and we will see how to approach the management as the Chairman said.”

FRAUD:  Staff threatens to ground activities in LUTH over wrong narrative in Pay Slip