DR. MARJORIE Theresa Yee-Sing, Senior Medical Officer and consultant surgeon at the Port Antonio Hospital, Portland, who has been interdicted from her post with half pay since October 3 for allegedly abandoning her job, has taken the matter to the Supreme Court.
She is asking the court to quash the letter issued by the Governor-General on the instruction of the Jamaica Public Services Commission that she should be interdicted and disciplinary proceedings taken against her.
Mr. Justice Algernon Smith heard the application in chambers on Wednesday and granted her leave to take the matter to the Judicial Review Court.
Respondents to the motion filed are the Governor-General, the Public Services Commission and the Northeast Regional Health Authority.
She was interdicted on the ground that she went on vacation leave and did not return at the time when her leave expired, thereby abandoning her job. Also that she went abroad without permission and worked overseas when she did not have any permission to do so.
She has given an affidavit denying the allegations. Dr. Yee-Sing said that in March she applied for four months' leave to commence April 16 and the application was approved.
According to her, the letter approving her leave erroneously stated that she should resume duties August 3 instead of August 21. She said she reported for work on August 23 but was told to leave the hospital compound immediately. She said she had been informed by her colleagues and "do verily believe" that any statutory or other requirement, as it related to public officers being required to obtain permission to travel overseas on vacations or otherwise (or to undertake private practice or private employment contracts within or without of Jamaica), has traditionally been waived in respect of medical practitioners from time immemorial.
She said she had stated in her leave application that she was going to undertake courses of study which were not offered in Jamaica. She said her acceptance of a four-month contract as a surgeon with the Cayman Islands Health Services Department at Faiths Hospital from April 17 to August 15 was a necessary pre-condition to undertaking the said courses.
Mr. Justice Smith after hearing submissions from attorney-at-law Arthur Kitchin, gave Dr. Yee-Sing leave to challenge the matter in the Judicial Review Court later this year. She will be asking the Judicial Review Court to bar the Public Services Commission from instituting disciplinary proceedings against her or, alternatively, seek an order to compel the Public Services Commission to bring disciplinary charges against her forthwith or withdraw the notice of interdiction.
Last month, Dr. Yee-Sing received a letter dated October 3 from Owen Belvett, regional director of the Northeast Regional Authority, informing her that the Governor-General, acting on the advice of the Public Services Commission, had directed that she be interdicted from her post on half pay. Also, she was advised that disciplinary proceedings would be instituted against her. It was also ordered that her private practice privilege at the hospital compound be restricted only to official business with the hospital administration.
Dr. Yee-Sing applied to the Supreme Court for leave to apply for an order of prohibition to bar the Governor-General, the Public Services Commission and the Regional Health Authority from instituting disciplinary proceedings against her. Mr. Kitchin who is being instructed by the law firm Watson and Watson, made the application on the ground that the allegations which formed the basis of the interdiction against Dr. Yee Sing were groundless and without factual foundation.
The judge granted the applications sought and also granted an order which will operate as a stay of proceedings in regard to Dr. Yee-Sing's restriction to the hospital compound.
The stay means that Dr. Yee-Sing who has been the Senior Medical Officer at the hospital since May 1990, can continue to operate her private practice on the hospital compound until the motion has been heard by the Judicial Review Court.
