The Attorney General’s Office reported today that the Public Prosecution has ordered the detention of the Tripoli based Acting Minister of Health, Ramadan Abu Janah, the Director of the Pharmacy Department, the Head of the Public Tender Committee, the official of the Central Tenders Committee at the Ministry of Health, and the Commissioner of a Pharmaceutical Import Company.
The Attorney General’s Office said the Public Prosecution examined the regularity of the procedures for importing a drug used in the treatment of tumours from one of the pharmaceutical factories in Iraq.
The Attorney General’s Office said that the investigator verified that the officials violated the controls governing the purchase of this class of medicines and analysed them from the rules governing the management of contracts and in terms of their technical, financial and legal requirements.
As a result, the Public Prosecution, it reported, decided to detain the five defendants, pending investigation.
PM Aldabaiba sacks Health Minister Abujanah for procedurally irregular Iraqi medicine import
It will be recalled that on 29 April this year, Tripoli based Libyan PM Aldabaiba sacked Acting Health Minister (who is also a Deputy PM), Ramadan Abujanah (Decree No. 185 of 2025) from his post. The decree does not affect Abujanah’s role as Deputy Prime Minister.
The decision had also stipulated the suspension of several officials from work and their referral to administrative investigation, headed by the Acting Minister, ‘‘against the background of violating the rules of jurisdiction assigned to the National Authority for Cancer Control, in accordance with Cabinet Resolution No. (963) of 2022’’.
The sacking comes on the back of the then Acting Health Minister contracting with Iraq to purchase cancer treatment medicine from its factory. Procedure prescribes that the Minister should have obtained the prior approval of the National Authority for Cancer Control before agreeing such a purchase.
The power of social media
The story exploded on Libyan social media a few days before the Acting Minister’s sacking after the Iraqi Health Minister celebrated the export to Iraqi news.
Libyan social media, however, portrayed the import of Iraqi medicine as yet another act of corruption by its politicians, preferring to import perceived cheaper and inferior Iraqi medicine instead of the more expensive, leading international brands.
This, despite the Health Ministry holding a press conference to assure the public that it had sent an inspection team to inspect the Iraqi factory, and that the factory fulfils all international medical production and formula standards.
Will the PM lift ministerial immunity?
It is unclear whether Tripoli based Libyan Prime Minister, Aldabaiba, will lift Minister of Health Ramadan Abu Janah’s ministerial immunity. He may be confined to his home.
It will be recalled that in March this year, despite the Appeal Court sentencing the Tripoli based Minister of Education to three years and six months in jail for corrupt contracting procedures for the printing and supply of schoolbooks, he was allowed to roam free in his hometown.
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