The District Manager of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) in North Dayi, Mr. Edem Sebastian has come out to defend the Member of Parliament (MP) for the area, Joycelyn Tetteh Quashie, against allegations of sabotaging President John Dramani Mahama’s health initiative.
Mr. Sebastian described the reports as “regrettable and unfortunate,” saying they were false and intended to create unnecessary tension between the MP and the president.
“Those reports are completely misleading and should be ignored; rather than sabotaging anyone, the MP has been our strongest supporter in our ongoing drive to register more residents onto the NHIS,” he said.
Speaking to journalists, Mr. Sebastian accused the authors of the allegations of attempting to undermine the Authority’s mass registration exercise, which has benefited significantly from the MP’s sponsorship and collaboration.
He explained that Joycelyn Quashie’s initiative — dubbed “Free Health Insurance Renewal and Registration Exercise” — is a personal intervention aimed at supporting her constituents, and is distinct from President Mahama’s Free Primary Healthcare Agenda, which is yet to be implemented in the district.
According to him, the MP’s intervention came at a critical time when residents were unable to pay for registration, threatening the Authority’s performance indicators.
He noted that the district NHIA office had appealed to stakeholders for assistance in meeting its annual target, and the MP was the only one who responded positively.
“We started operations in July this year and are expected to register about 80 per cent of the over 41,000 residents in the district.
“However, only a limited category of persons—referred to as indigenes—qualify for free registration, and that represents less than 40 per cent of the population, the rest must pay before being enrolled, which has made meeting our target difficult,” he explained.
Mr. Edem revealed that the MP had offered to sponsor free registration and renewal for her constituents, and this was not the first time she had done so.
“Even before our district office was created, she collaborated with the Kpando NHIA to register her people and personally paid for it,” he added.
He expressed shock that the MP’s goodwill gesture had been “twisted” in the media to tarnish her reputation. He criticized The Campaigner newspaper, which first published the story, for failing to cite credible sources or provide verifiable evidence.
“The newspaper didn’t attribute the allegation to anyone. That alone shows the story was fabricated; we have not received any directive from anywhere to register everyone for free, so the claim that the MP is rebranding a presidential initiative is baseless,” he stressed.
Mr. Edem Sebastian suggested that the publication might have been motivated by internal political rivalry, warning against dragging the NHIA into partisan disputes.
“I suspect this is an internal party issue, we are a state institution and must not be drawn into any political squabbles that could derail our work,” he stated.
He reiterated that aside from the MP, none of the other stakeholders approached by the NHIA offered any assistance toward the registration exercise.
