02:20 PM
Tuesday 01 March 2022
Books – Ahmed Adel:
Today, Tuesday, the Cairo Criminal Court, held in the Fifth Settlement, continues to hear witnesses in the trial of 4 defendants in the case known in the media as “bribery of the Ministry of Health.”
The first witness, director of the free treatment zone in Cairo, said that she was notified one day of the death of Corona at Dar Al-Saha Hospital, and this hospital was not among the hospitals licensed to operate.
And she continued before the court, that she addressed the competent authority to close the hospital, and when the decision to close was issued, she gave the hospital 15 days to evacuate it, and when I went to implement the closure decision, I was surprised by the presence of cases in the operating room.
She added that she met Dr. Salah Qassem with two others, and a person spoke to me on the phone, who introduced me himself as the minister’s husband, and told me that the licenses were about to be issued and that he would talk to Dr. Hisham Zaki, the director of the administration.
I called Dr. Hisham Zaki, and told him that someone had identified me as the minister’s husband, and told me that the hospital had a licensing file with the ministry, and asked me to stop implementing the closure decision.
The Public Prosecutor, Counselor Hamada Al-Sawy, had referred the four defendants to the criminal trial, against the background of accusing the first defendant of requesting an amount of 5 million pounds, of which 600,000 pounds were taken, as a bribe from the owners of a private hospital through other defendants, in exchange for using his influence to obtain from officials in the Ministry Health has decisions and benefits related to not implementing the decision to close the hospital to its management without a license, and preparing a forged report that proves – contrary to the truth – the absence of any violations in it, and the fourth accused was charged with committing the fraud.
The case papers included evidence derived from the statements of 13 witnesses, including the hospital owners who informed the Administrative Control Authority of the bribery incident upon its request, and Saira the bribe – with the permission of the Public Prosecution – until his arrest.
The evidence in the case also included the statements of the two defendants who mediated in the bribery, and the examination of the accused’s seized mobile phones and the correspondence that confirmed the commission of the incident, as well as the Public Prosecution’s review of all examination reports of the hospital, both valid and forged, and bank documents proving the fact that the case was submitted. The amount of the bribe, in addition to what was confirmed by the Public Prosecution’s witnessing and listening to the meeting and conversations that were authorized to be recorded.