Than Duc Lai, 63, former director of Bac Giang Provincial Social Insurance, faces a recommended sentence of 4 years 6 months to 5 years 6 months from the Hanoi People's Procuracy for bribery. The charges are linked to a case involving several pharmaceutical companies.

Lai served as director from 2011 to 12/2021, holding the authority to approve health insurance disbursements for hospitals in Bac Giang province. During this period, Nguyen Manh Quyen, owner of LanQ Hospital, sought favorable conditions for these disbursements and approached Lai. Facilitation payments were allegedly made at the beginning of each quarter, preceding each round of Social Insurance payments for hospital medications.

The total amount Lai is accused of receiving is 700 million VND. However, in court today, he announced he would share "a story never told to investigators" to demonstrate his lack of personal gain. This story details an instance where he refused an exceptionally large gift.

Former director of Bac Giang Provincial Social Insurance Than Duc Lai. *Photo: Danh Lam*

The incident occurred as Lai was preparing for retirement, in his office at the Bac Giang Provincial Social Insurance. Nguyen Manh Quyen, Chairman of LanQ Hospital and its pharmaceutical company, was the person who brought the gift.

In court, Lai emphasized "a very large gift package" three times. He stated that Quyen described it as a set of valuable deer antler, imported from Russia and not yet available in the Vietnamese market, "specially crafted to give to you for helping us." Believing the gesture was innocent, Lai immediately accepted it.

Later, upon opening the gift, he found a valuable box containing the deer antler set. In another gift bag, he was alarmed to discover an item that appeared to be an envelope. He immediately called Quyen, asking him to return and retrieve everything, explaining that he "could not use this gift."

Lai argued that recounting this event was not to justify his actions, but to prove that during his tenure, he approved annual disbursements of tens of billions of VND for LanQ, yet only received 700 million VND over six years, which he considered a "thank you" gift.

The former Social Insurance director admitted that receiving money was wrong but attributed it to his limited understanding at the time. "When I committed the offense, I did not fully understand the legal nature of accepting gifts from businesses, considering it unavoidable," he stated.

Regarding the sentence proposed by the Procuracy, Lai considered it "excessive," arguing that sacrificing 40 years of Party membership and 40 years of service for the alleged amount was "too costly."

Previously, he stated he had been awarded the Labor Order twice and was processing documents for a third award when he was arrested.

Offense committed under 'exceptional circumstances'

Clarifying the context of the offense, Lai stated that the incident occurred during the 2016-2017 period, stemming from the actual difficulties faced by LanQ Hospital. At that time, the facility was overwhelmed with patients, lacked sufficient financial resources, and even owed doctors' salaries.

He explained that LanQ, a traditional medicine hospital, had many self-prepared methods and remedies that lacked standardized regulations and were not promptly updated in the health insurance catalog, leading to payment difficulties. Consequently, to this day, the former Bac Giang Provincial Social Insurance still withholds about 20% of annual costs, totaling an estimated nearly 20 billion VND that cannot be finalized.

"I clearly saw the business's difficulties, which was the motivation," Lai stated.

According to testimony, during a situation report, Quyen, Chairman of LanQ, proposed that Lai, in his role as head of the provincial Social Insurance, implement a policy to resolve the hospital's issues.

Lai stated that he responded he would provide support within permissible limits and that "Mr. Quyen did not have to plead a single word." Driven by this sympathy, he proactively helped with many things, but affirmed he never raised the issue of "helping for personal gain."

These difficulties were also previously presented by Quyen in his testimony. He stated that it was very difficult to disburse social insurance funds and that he was losing money when selling medicines to patients according to the insurance-covered list. However, in this case, he is accused of inflating prices and using different drugs with overlaid labels for sale during patient treatment at the hospital.

His hospital later received 40 billion VND in payments from Bac Giang Provincial Social Insurance. Of this, 18 billion VND was identified as illicit gains from fraudulent activities.

This morning, during the sentencing arguments, in addition to proposing sentences for 23 defendants, the Procuracy also recommended that social insurance agencies in provinces and cities and departments of health strengthen state management in the field of providing medicines under health insurance. This aims to ensure the rights of health insurance participants and limit difficulties and harassment for drug suppliers.

Tomorrow, the trial enters its 5th day.

By Thanh Lam