FG Orders NHIS Council To Suspend Further Activities

In a move indicative of Federal Government displeasure with the Council of the National Health Insurance Scheme, NHIS, the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation has again directed the Council to suspend all activities pending resolution of the crisis in the agency.

Following protracted disagreement between the Executive Secretary, Professor Usman Yusuf, and the Chairman of the Council, Dr. Enyantu Ifenne, the FG had on October 31 last year intervened in the crisis and ordered the suspension of the former.

The Government immediately constituted a seven-man probe panel headed by Dr Hassan Bukar, a retired Permanent Secretary.

The panel was initially given two weeks to submit its report but requested more time in order to do a thorough job.

The Panel finally submitted its report on December 24 last year after more than seven weeks of investigation.

But in violation of an FG instruction suspending activities of the NHIS Council pending the resolution of the problems, Dr Ifenne refused to suspend Council activities and was still calling for meetings.

THE WHISTLER reliably gathered that the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, was piqued at the violation of the FG directives that all activities of the agency be suspended.

Thus, a new directive was issued to the Council on December 26 last year calling on it to suspend all activities until the FG takes a decision on the report of the Presidential Probe Panel.

“An official letter from the OSGF directing the immediate suspension of all activities of the NHIS Council was received in NHIS on December 26,” a top management staff of the agency disclosed to THE WHISTLER on Tuesday.

A decision on the report of the panel is expected to be made before end of next week.