The Tribune

AMID controversy surrounding his tenure and resignation from McGill University, Cancer Centre of the Bahamas managing director Dr Arthur Porter has been admitted to Doctors Hospital to begin treatment for cancer.

According to Dr Conville Brown, the president of the Medical Pavilion Bahamas, Dr Porter will undergo a surgical procedure for a newly discovered malignancy at Doctors before he receives radiotherapy and chemotherapy at the Cancer Centre, but will continue to manage the clinic and his practice.

Dr Porter is principally responsible for the Cancer Centre becoming the only American College of Radiation Oncology (ACRO)-accredited Centre in the Caribbean and this hemisphere outside of North America.

The news of his illness comes on the heels of a lawsuit filed by the university last November that alleges that Dr Porter owes the facility $317,153.89, the balance of a loan, and $30,131.63 after he was overpaid. Dr Porter resigned from both his position as the executive director of the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC) and as chair of the Security Intelligence Review Committee (SIRC), after his ties to a controversial lobbyist became public. Ari Ben-Menashe, a Montreal-based businessman and an ex-Israeli international lobbyist and arms dealer, was arrested and charged in the United States with illegally attempting to sell military transport airplanes to Iran.

The lawsuit states that Mr Porter had promised by email to make provisions to repay the funds in October, but that the University has been unable to make contact with him since that time. According to Canadian media, there had been speculation as to Dr Porter’s whereabouts as he had listed contact information in both his native Sierra Leone and the Bahamas - where he is said to have a home in Old Fort Bay.

Subsequent to his resignation - MUHC which was seeking to build a “billion dollar super hospital, is also being investigated for not being able to document more than 800,000 hours in unauthorised pay and could face $53 million in cuts.

According to Canadian media,The Quebec government recently released the results of an audit that found the MUHC’s planned deficit of $12-million has ballooned to $115-million – a financial state so precarious that the hospital network has been assigned a special overseer to monitor its spending. The Health Ministry called the move one step short of trusteeship.

Quebec’s anti-corruption task force has also alleged that the hospital network was the victim of fraud in connection with its planned $1.3-billion super-hospital, which is due to be unveiled in 2015. In November, police charged two former executives at SNC-Lavalin, the engineering firm that was awarded the contract during Dr Porter’s tenure, with multiple criminal charges, including fraud and using falsified documents.

The Tribune spoke with Julie Fortier, a media spokeswoman at McGill University, who said the facility wants to look into this latest development before commenting.