Libya's Deputy Prime Minister Mustafa Abu Shagur said that the healthcare scheme had cost the National Transitional Coucil $800 million so far
LONDON (TrustLaw) – The recent suspension of a Libyan healthcare scheme for injured victims of the country’s civil war was due to widespread fraud and corruption in the programme, according to a BBC report this week.
Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) announced in September that it would pay for those wounded fighting former leader Muammar Gaddafi’s forces last year to receive healthcare abroad. The Global Health Programme would cost $400 million but would relieve some of the strain on Libya’s overworked hospitals, the BBC reported then-Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril as saying.
Four months on, the programme has been suspended after thousands of Libyans - some with minor complaints, some with no medical problems at all - went on all-expenses-paid trips abroad, the BBC said.
Deputy Prime Minister Mustafa Abu Shagur told the broadcaster the scheme had cost the NTC $800 million so far.
“We have around 40,000 people out of the country. If you talk about the wounded, I would say only 10 to 15 percent of them are wounded,” the BBC quoted Abu Shagur as saying. “And because of the financial incentives, some of them take maybe three of four family members with them,” he added.
While the newly created Ministry of War Wounded was supposed to have managed the scheme, in practice local committees created during Libya’s civil war decided who would benefit from the programme, the BBC said.
An independent audit of the scheme is underway and the NTC has asked the governments of countries where Libyans received treatment to investigate what Abu Shagur said was serious overcharging by private hospitals, the BBC reported.
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