Three pharmacy assistants and a King Sabata Dalindyebo Municipality employee were arrested for allegedly stealing hundreds of thousands of rands worth of government medication.
They face charges of theft and corruption for stealing medication to the value of an estimated R220 000.
The Hawks pounced on the four in Mthatha following a nine month long investigation which saw police go undercover and buy medication from unsuspecting pharmacy assistants at the Mthatha main depot and Nyandeni Sub-district depot.
The Hawks confiscated stashes of medicine and KDS vehicle allegedly used to transport the stolen medicines.
The arrests come almost a month after Nyandeni medical depot in Nelson Mandela Academic Hospital was set alight in what the department believes was an attempt to conceal evidence. It also comes hot on the heels of a bungled investigation into the investigation into the theft of baby formula.
Yesterday, Hawks spokesperson McIntosh Polela said three of the four suspects worked at department depots and another at the KSD Municipality.
“We received information that people that were working at the Department of Health, instead of taking medicine to clinics and hospitals where they were needed, were selling them and making money out of that,” Polela said. “What is intriguing about this is that one of the people involved works for the municipality and we have information that a municipal vehicle was used to transport the stolen medication,” he said.
Two of the pharmacy assistants were arrested at the depots while another was arrested as she received payment for stolen medicine by an undercover policeman.
The KSD vehicle was nabbed at a garage while allegedly delivering the medicine in the municipal vehicle. After being arrested at the different places in Mthatha, the suspects were taken to the off ices of organised crime unit in York Road where they were formally charged.
MEC for Health Sicelo Gqobana visited the unit’s offices “I am very shocked to learn that our own officials are pulling the department and their government down by stealing medicine that ought to be in our institutions, but instead they are running a business while we are putting every effort to serve our people and improve our health system,”Gqobana said.
Gqobana also said the department would intensify the campaign against corruption “we have got to ensure that we put them behind bars, to ensure that where it is possible, we are able to penalised them” If doctors are linked to this kind of scam, once we discover those doctors we will have to put an end to their careers.”
The department officials who had been arrested would be suspended pending the outcome of their cases.” As soon as the suspects who are working for the Health Department appear in court, the Superintendent General will have to suspend them immediately no matter what,” he said.
The MEC further urged anyone with information on corruption in the department to blow the whistle. “We urge people to inform us when they become aware of these activities,” he said.
Source: Department of Health
