Korle-Bu boss cited for contempt

Lawyers for the sacked Director of Pharmacy at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH), Elizabeth Bruce, has filed contempt proceedings against the chairman of the hospital’s Board, Professor Anthony Mawuli Sallar and its Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Dr Gilbert Buckle, over the dismissal of their client.

They are praying the Accra High Court, which is set to hear the contempt case on July 8, 2015, to commit the two top men to prison and also impose ‘a very heavy fine’ on Korle-Bu as an entity, for contempt over the dismissal of their client and any orders that the court may deem fit.

It follows the dismissal of the Director of Pharmacy and three other senior staff of the hospital, including Eric Kwaku Kyei, Principal Pharmacist, Pharmacy Manager, Mrs Augustina Dankyi, Pharmacy Accountant and Daniel Eledi, a Stores Assistant over alleged fraud.

They were part of nine staff who were interdicted early this year over the misappropriation of GH¢945, 574.29.

Argument

In an affidavit in support of the motion which was filed on Monday, June 22, 2015, lawyers for Mrs Bruce at Kwakwaduam Chambers said following an unlawful ‘forensic audit’ by a private firm of chartered accountants, pursuant to an unlawful appointment by the minister of health, their client was unlawfully interdicted on 29 January, 2015 by management and Board of Korle-Bu without recourse to the mandatory provisions of the Ghana Health Service and Teaching Hospitals Act, 1996 (Act 525) and the Civil Service Regulations, 1960 (L. I. 47).

Mrs Bruce noted that after her interdiction, an Administrative Enquiry Committee was unlawfully set up by the hospital “to establish my culpability if any,” in the findings of the ‘forensic audit’ and that on 10 April, 2015, she instituted a civil action in the same court for a number of reliefs endorsed on the motion paper (HRCM/263/15), yet the hospital authorities proceeded to relief her of her appointment.

She was therefore of the conviction that the press statement purporting to dismiss her, issued by the Board and management of Korle-Bu in the pendency of the instant action, was calculated at interfering with and obstructing the due administration of justice and in the event, bring the authority of a court of competent jurisdiction into disrepute.

“This,” according to her, “was because the validity of the basis of my purported dismissal was the very subject matter of the action which is currently pending before the court.”

Justification

The suit specifically seeks reliefs in the nature of a prohibition of the institution of disciplinary measures against Mrs Bruce by the hospital on the strength of what it believed to be the unlawful interdiction, an order of mandamus to compel the Board of Korle-Bu as an institution, to allow her to resume normal duties as the director of pharmacy of the hospital as well as a prohibition of disciplinary proceedings on the basis of the purported ‘forensic audit’ and the administrative enquiry against her.

According to her, they were fully aware of the pendency of the said action and in point of fact, the CEO of Korle-Bu, with the consent of the Board, filed an affidavit in opposition to her action on 22 May, 2015.

What baffled her was the fact that even though the Korle-Bu CEO swore an oath that the administrative enquiry being undertaken by the hospital was not “meant to punish any of the staff, including the Applicant” and that the “Board has no intention to punish any of the staff as a result of the Administrative Enquiry,” just before the action would be set down for hearing in accordance with Rule 67 of the High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, C. I. 47, she heard that a copy of a letter purporting to dismiss her as director of pharmacy of Korle Bu was being read on Radio Gold, an Accra-based radio station.