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Harare Bureau
The top management at Premier Service Medical Aid Society (PSMAS) is gobbling at least $1 million in basic monthly salaries at a time the State enterprise is reeling under a $38 million debt.As at December 31, the society owed service providers $38 million in unpaid bills for medical services rendered to its members.
Documents in possession of our correspondent show that the PSMAS group chief executive, Cuthbert Dube’s basic salary increased to $230,000 a month in July 2012 compared to $144,000 he was earning in June of the same year.
The PSMAS annual wage bill rose from $15,5 million in 2011 to $33,4 million in 2012, almost half of which was paid to the top 14 managers.
After Dube, the next two top earners, according to the documents, were the group finance manager, a E Gwinyai (no longer with the PSMAS) who earned a basic salary of $200,000 a month, and group operations executive Mr Enock Chitekedza whose salary was $122,000.
Eight other senior directors were earning a basic salary of $60,000 every month. Three other middle managers were paid $30,000, $22,000 and $15,000 each.
This brings the monthly wage bill of the top 14 managers to nearly $1,1 million. Everyone else at PSMAS earned a combined $900,000 a month, the documents show.
Further, all group executives recently received $300,000 each which was approved by Dube, for as yet unclear reasons. In June of 2012, the monthly wage bill of the top 14 was $570,969 and it increased to $744,000 in July and August.
Minutes of a meeting held on Wednesday July 4, 2012 show that Dube approved lump sum payments of $300,000 for each of the group’s executives and these payments were to be made from arrear subscriptions recovered from the private sector.
“It was agreed that a special bank account administered by the three collective bargaining committee representatives in liason with the group finance executive be opened for that purpose with immediate effect,” read part of the minutes.
The minutes further state that the representatives should on a regular basis update the group chief executive on the inflows and disbursements from the said special bank account.
The documents also show that PSMAS bought a house in Glen Lorne, Harare for about $534,000 in April 2014 for Dube. It could not be established by the time of going to Press whether the money advanced for the purchase of the house was a loan advanced to Dube or was part of his package as group CEO.
Dube had in the afternoon said he could not comment as he was busy. He said he would be free to talk after 6pm but his mobile phone went unanswered up to the time of going to print.
Efforts to get comment from board chair Meisie Makeletso Namasasu and her deputy Newton Mhlanga also failed last night.
PSMAS group legal and corporate secretary Cosmas Mukwesha yesterday dismissed the alleged salary schedule in our possession saying employees last got an increment in 2011.
Mukwesha could not be drawn into revealing the “correct” salary schedule, saying: “Issues of salaries are private and confidential but I assure you they are far from the figures you are talking about.”
He said PSMAS was working on a salaries review with assistance from officials from the Ministry of Finance. On the $300,000 once-off lump sum that our documents show was approved for all group executives, Mukwesha said the money was yet to be paid out because of financial limitations.
He said the lump sum was a housing loan that would be deducted from salaries monthly. But Health and Child Care Minister Dr David Parirenyatwa said government was investigating the matter.
“We are investigating the allegations in an intense manner together with other issues that are happening in the medical aid industry.
“We want to put things under control in a sustainable manner for the benefit of the country,” Dr Parirenyatwa said
He said apart from the salaries, his ministry – in conjunction with the Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Ministry – was also looking at medical aid subscriptions and service providers’ tariffs among other things.
Government monitors and regulates medical aid societies’ operations. It licences them to operate as societies and has the mandate to de-register them when they fall short of requirements.
PSMAS is the biggest and oldest society in Zimbabwe catering for more than 600,000 people, the majority of whom are civil servants and members of the uniformed forces.
Online Reporter