Ani­ka Gumbs-San­di­ford

For­eign and lo­cal doc­tors at­tached to var­i­ous health in­sti­tu­tions through­out the coun­try have been il­le­gal­ly oc­cu­py­ing hous­ing quar­ters un­der the dis­guise of in­terns. The French Vil­lage apart­ments, on the com­pound of the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex (EWM­SC), were built as tem­po­rary ac­com­mo­da­tion for stu­dents en­rolled in the three-year in­tern­ship pro­gramme run by the Min­istry of Health.

How­ev­er, a T&T Guardian in­ves­ti­ga­tion un­earthed that to date many of the apart­ments are still be­ing oc­cu­pied by doc­tors who com­plet­ed their in­tern­ship sev­er­al years ago. In fact, of­fi­cial ten­ant records ob­tained by the T&T Guardian re­vealed that in one in­stance an apart­ment is oc­cu­pied by the same ten­ant it was rent­ed to in 1993. In­ves­ti­ga­tions dis­cov­ered the ten­ant to be a well-known doc­tor in the de­part­ment of med­i­cine at­tached to the EWM­SC.

Ac­cord­ing to the rental agree­ment the in­terns are ex­pect­ed to va­cate the apart­ments when they com­plete their in­tern­ship. In­ves­ti­ga­tions, how­ev­er, re­vealed sev­er­al of the doc­tors who now earn salaries be­tween $22,000 and $28,000 have nev­er moved out. Ac­cord­ing to fi­nan­cial records the sin­gle and two-bed­room apart­ments were of­fered to the in­terns at a min­i­mal month­ly rate of $1,400-$1,600, based on the stipend they re­ceive.

In 2010, records show, the rental for the apart­ments in­creased to $2,500. News­pa­per and on­line ads sug­gest that the mark­er rate for com­pa­ra­ble apart­ments in the area is $4,500-$6,500. The records al­so show sev­er­al cou­ples are still con­tin­u­ing to en­joy the low-cost hous­ing ben­e­fit in­tend­ed for in­terns even though they are now em­ployed at var­i­ous re­gion­al health au­thor­i­ties (RHAs). The doc­tors are at­tached to the:

• EWM­SC

• Mt Hope Women's Hos­pi­tal

• Cau­ra Hos­pi­tal

• Ari­ma Health Fa­cil­i­ty

• St Joseph Health Cen­tre

• Phar­ma­cy (Uni­ver­si­ty of West In­dies)

• Ra­di­ol­o­gy (EWM­SC)

The apart­ments in ques­tion are Dor­dogne, Rous­sil­lon, Al­sace, Vendee, Savoie, Provence and build­ings 55 to 59. The apart­ments are main­ly oc­cu­pied by doc­tors from Nige­ria, In­dia and Cu­ba. Lo­cals were al­so found to be oc­cu­py­ing the apart­ments un­der the same con­di­tions. Records fur­ther showed that unit two of the Provence apart­ments has been rent­ed free of charge since Oc­to­ber 2011 based on the con­trac­tu­al agree­ment.

T&T Guardian un­der­stands that on­ly re­cent­ly a se­nior of­fi­cial at the EWM­SC raised a red flag on doc­tors rent­ing the apart­ments was leas­ing his pri­vate prop­er­ty. In­ves­ti­ga­tions, how­ev­er, re­vealed that to date the doc­tor con­tin­ues to oc­cu­py the rental apart­ment.

Checks at the Land and Build­ing de­part­ment at the Min­istry of Le­gal Af­fairs con­firmed that sev­er­al of the doc­tors are own­ers of mul­ti­mil­lion-dol­lar prop­er­ties in Val­sayn, Lange Park, Ch­agua­nas, Ari­ma and in San Fer­nan­do. Fur­ther prob­ing found that sev­er­al of the doc­tors run pri­vate prac­tices apart from be­ing em­ployed by the RHA.

"For too long these doc­tors have been al­lowed to abuse the sys­tem," said a hos­pi­tal source, "with­out any­one hold­ing them ac­count­able for their ac­tions. "They are de­priv­ing in­terns of ac­com­mo­da­tion. Many in­terns have been forced to find their own ac­com­mo­da­tion due to these doc­tors and no ac­tion is be­ing tak­en to re­move them from the apart­ments. "The agree­ment is at the end of the in­tern­ship the doc­tors are sup­posed to va­cate the apart­ments but this is not hap­pen­ing."

The mat­ter is en­gag­ing the at­ten­tion of Health Min­is­ter Dr Fuad Khan, who on Fri­day con­firmed he had asked to re­view the ten­an­cy records for the apart­ments. "The mat­ter was brought to my at­ten­tion and I asked for a de­tailed re­port on all the ten­ants oc­cu­py­ing the French Vil­lage apart­ments," the min­is­ter said.

Told the T&T Guardian had ob­tained a copy of the re­port that showed sev­er­al doc­tors were still oc­cu­py­ing the apart­ments even af­ter com­plet­ing their in­tern­ship, Khan said: "I have not yet com­plet­ed read­ing the re­port ful­ly, but it amazes me how these re­ports reach the me­dia." The min­is­ter said any­one found to be il­le­gal­ly oc­cu­py­ing the apart­ments would be made to va­cate them.

"The apart­ments were built for in­terns and are of­fered at pep­per­corn rates based on the stipend the in­terns re­ceive. I do not ex­pect doc­tors to be oc­cu­py­ing these apart­ments. "With­out fear or favour I am say­ing if any doc­tor is found to be oc­cu­py­ing those apart­ments they would be served with no­tices to va­cate the apart­ments im­me­di­ate­ly. "The apart­ments were built to ac­com­mo­date in­terns, not doc­tors," the min­is­ter said.