Aasandha Company suspected of corruption, to be audited

Following suspicion of corruption in the national health insurance service provider Aasandha Private Limited, the Financial Committee has made the decision to conduct an audit of the company.

The report sent to the Parliament by the Financial Committee proposes to conduct an audit of Aasandha Company for three months from January 2012. This audit report must be completed and presented to Auditor General within one month.

This decision was made when studies revealed that more money was spent by Aasandha Company than necessary, based on the number of people who obtained the service. Also, the number of people seeking the service was implausibly high. The most alarming statistic for members of Financial Committee was that 163,000 people had used Aasandha services to obtain eyeglasses in the first three months of the year - about Rf 44m was spent on purchase of eyeglasses alone.

The proposition to conduct an audit of Aasandha Company was made by Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) Parliamentary Group Nolhivaram MP Mohamed Nasheed (Colonel). His proposition was supported by Vilifushi MP Riyaz Rasheed.

Maafannu Dhekunu MP Abdullah Abdul Raheem said that private clinics benefit from misuse of Aasandha services. He accused that the clinics are owned by senior personnel of Ministry of Health and operated within one network. He also accused Ministry of Health of making arrangements such that these groups benefit.

Kulhudhuffushi Uthuru MP Abdul Gafoor Moosa (Gapo) said that the number of people who had obtained healthcare services and purchased eyeglasses under Aasandha scheme are not realistic based on any standard. He requested NSPA to provide the list of names of people who purchased eyeglasses under Aasandha.

Bilaydhoo MP Ahmed Hamza noted that while it is claimed that Rf 3m is spent on Aasandha daily, no details of Aasandha expenditure have been presented to the committee so far.