Boram Hospital

In March 2015 the local media broke the story on the awarding of a K1.2 million contract to an East Sepik Province contractor to fix a toilet at the Wewak General Hospital (National, 2015).

The value of the contract and how it escaped scrutiny of the relevant officials – who were charged with the responsibility to monitor the disbursement of public funds – infuriated the public.

The case confirmed and pointed to security lapses at commercial banks when clearing cheques valued between K50,000 and over K1 million.

In July 2015 the East Sepik provincial administrator and two other persons appeared before the Wewak District Court for misappropriating K1.1 million belonging to the Wewak General Hospital in a separate case (National, The National, 2016).

The ability of the contractor to bypass the procurement requirements when cashing the cheque points to the absence of an effective checks and balance system.

The loss of K1.1 million and K1.2 million in public funds belonging to the hospital does not augur well for a health institution striving to deliver life-saving services in the face of dwindling government and private sector support.

The biggest challenge for the hospital’s current management is winning back the trust and confidence of the public after a tumultuous 5 years.

Publicly-funded hospitals – which are likely to get the bulk of a province’s sick population at any one time – should not become training grounds for over-ambitious and inexperienced chief executive officers.

After 42 years of independence as a nation, the recruitment of hospital administrators should be a joint exercise between the provincial government and the National Department of Health and is transparent and merit-based.