News:
April 23, 2025
The Minority in Parliament has demanded the reinstatement of the sacked Chief Executive Officer of the Tamale Teaching Hospital (TTH), Dr. Adam Atiku.
A press release from the Minority Caucus on the Health Committee on Wednesday, 23rd April 2025 said the dismissal of the CEO was unlawful as the Minister is not clothed with such powers to remove the CEO of a teaching hospital.
Thus, the action of the Health Minister, Kwabena Mintah Akando was carried out without recourse to due process and is a matter that raises serious constitutional, administrative, and governance concerns.
“Furthermore, Section 34(7) of the parent Act 525 stipulates that the removal of a member of a Teaching Hospital Board. which includes the CEO. must be affected by the President in consultation with the Council of State. The procedure adopted by the Minister thus violates the statutory safeguards surrounding appointments and removals at this level of public administration”.
They noted that the Minister’s own admission that the dismissal is not solely based on the recent unfortunate death of a patient at the Hospital, but rather an exercise of power and the “appointing authority owes nobody any explanation is not only authoritarian but diametrically opposed to the principles of administrative justice, accountability, and the rule of law.
The development they said thus require the reinstatement of the governing legal framework for the administration of Teaching Hospitals in Ghana. Section 37(1)(e) of the Ghana Health Service and Teaching Hospitals (Amendment) Act, 2019 (Act 1009). provides that the Chief Executive Officer of a teaching hospital shall be the Chief Administrator and a member of the Hospital’s Governing Board. The law does not confer unilateral power on the Minister of Health to dismiss the CEO of a teaching hospital, let alone in the manner and under the circumstances now in issue.
The Minority asserts that the Minister’s actions during his surprise visit to the Tamale Teaching Hospital where he was engaged in a heated verbal exchange with some staff were not only unlawful but emotionally charged and rash resulting from the deplorable state of the facility and some essential equipment including ventilators, diagnostic and sterilisation machinery, and MRI scanning systems coupled with the recent death of a patient, reportedly due to the absence of a working ventilator.
The Minority Caucus charged health professional bodies including the Ghana Medical Association, the Giana Registered Nurses and Midwives Association, the Pharmaceutical Society of Ghana, the Health Services Workers Union, among others to rise in the defence of due process and institutional integrity.
Ghanamps.com