Published: July 13, 2026
MONROVIA — The Lutheran Church in Liberia has sent Phebe Hospital Medical Director Dr. Minnie S. Ricks on a one-month administrative leave, its most decisive move yet in a crisis that has shut down one of Liberia’s largest referral hospitals, flooded a neighboring facility with patients and now landed before the Liberian Senate.
Bishop Rev. Dr. Victor Padmore announced the decision Saturday at a press conference in Sinkor, saying the leave will allow an ongoing financial and administrative audit and a special investigative committee to complete their work without interference while protecting the rights of all parties. The committee was established to examine allegations raised by aggrieved workers, and the Church will act only when both reports are in hand.
“We cannot dismiss or remove staff based solely on allegations,” Padmore said, emphasizing that the accusations touch the integrity and professional reputations of those accused.
The Church’s intervention follows months of mounting tension that culminated in an indefinite go-slow by aggrieved workers on July 6. The workers accuse Ricks, Acting Administrator Jonathan L. Pewu and Acting Human Resource Officer Peter B. Gbelawoe of financial mismanagement, intimidation of employees, poor administrative practices and creating unsafe working conditions. They have consistently demanded the removal or reassignment of the three officials, arguing that previous interventions by the Ministry of Health, the Civil Service Agency and a church-appointed investigative committee failed to resolve the dispute. That committee’s report, workers complain, has remained outstanding for more than three months beyond its expected date.
The standoff turned volatile last week when three leaders of the Phebe Aggrieved Workers Union were arrested, prompting hundreds of health workers to protest in Gbarnga and temporarily barricade the Jor Bridge to demand their immediate release.
The human cost has spread across Bong County. Patients at Phebe were transferred to C.B. Dunbar Comprehensive Hospital in Gbarnga, driving a sharp rise in admissions and straining the facility. To cope, the Ministry of Health temporarily reassigned government-employed doctors stationed at Phebe to C.B. Dunbar to absorb the surge.
That reassignment has opened a new front in the dispute. Padmore protested Saturday that neither the Lutheran Church nor the hospital’s Board of Trustees was consulted before the ministry acted, and he appealed to the Ministry of Health to facilitate the reopening of Phebe so patients can again access care at the institution.
Bong County health authorities pushed back against suggestions the doctors had been permanently transferred. County Health Officer Dr. Daanue Paye Zwuogbae said the doctors were moved to C.B. Dunbar solely to help manage the overwhelming number of patients, many of them transferred from Phebe after the strike disrupted services. He said the County Health Team also declined a request by striking workers to report for duty at C.B. Dunbar while simultaneously pursuing their industrial action, maintaining that such an arrangement would undermine efforts to resolve the dispute.
The crisis has now reached the Senate. Acting on a communication from Bong County Sen. Prince Moye, who told plenary Thursday that the dispute stems more from internal leadership and governance failures than from inadequate government funding, the Senate has cited the Ministry of Health, the Civil Service Agency and the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning to appear before the Committee of the Whole at 10 a.m. Tuesday, July 14, to explain the challenges confronting Phebe Hospital and the institutional conflict rocking it.
Until the audit and committee reports land, Phebe’s wards remain quiet, its patients scattered, and the fate of its three most senior administrators in suspension.
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