Merina asks the Community of Madrid and the OMC to act against irregularities in the medical association

Dr. Tomás Merina , president-elect of the Illustrious Official College of Physicians of Madrid (Icomem), has requested protection from the Community of Madrid (CAM) and the Professional Medical Association (OMC) so that both institutions can act on the situation of democratic irregularities experienced by the Madrid medical association. In a letter sent to the Minister of the Presidency of the CAM, Miguel Ángel García Martín , Dr. Merina states that "his Department is responsible for overseeing the legality of professional associations."

A similar letter has also been sent to the OMC , reminding them that this organization "must monitor the legality of the Medical Associations." In both letters, the president-elect of Icomem asks for "help and protection" in the face of the "democratic scandal" experienced by the Madrid Medical Association. "We need you to help the doctors of Madrid exercise our democratic rights ," Merina states.

These requests for protection come after the acting Board of Directors of Icomem , chaired by Dr. Manuel Martínez Sellés, "failed to comply with its duty" to call the Icomem General Assembly to approve budgets, " ignoring the statutes" of the same and creating an unprecedented situation: "No one knows the financial status of the institution."

More than 100 doctors demand legal action

In addition, Dr. Merina has addressed the Icomem Legal Department to formally request the initiation of legal proceedings regarding the situation of "statutory violation and anti-democratic obstruction " created by the Board of Directors. "We request that the College's Legal Department initiate all types of action, including legal action, against the acting Board of Directors to defend the physicians," he states. This request has been supported by more than one hundred Icomem members and delegates , who have also submitted briefs to the College's Legal Department to request legal action against the actions of Dr. Martínez Selles' acting Board and its concealment of accounts.

The Madrid Medical Association has more than 52,000 registered physicians . At this time, none of them know how much money remains in the institution's coffers or how its common assets are being managed. When Dr. Martínez-Sellés arrived at the Association in 2020, the institution had €8.2 million in the bank. According to the financial analysis conducted by Dr. Tomás Merina's team , the management of these assets has been "so negligent" that at the moment "there are reasons to believe that the treasury is close to zero ."

They add that "the concealment of the College's financial status is another step in the anti-democratic drift" that Icomem has been experiencing since last December, when Dr. Tomás Merina 's candidacy won the elections with a landslide and the outgoing Board of Directors "entrenched itself" in the institution to prevent the transfer of power. Icomem's bylaws establish that the institution's representatives have the right and duty to participate in two Extraordinary Assemblies each year: one to approve the budget for the following year and another to examine and settle the accounts for the previous year.

Over the past six months, Dr. Martínez-Sellés neglected his duty to hold both assemblies, preventing the delegates— the elected representatives of physicians within the corporation—from exercising their oversight duties over the acting Board of Directors, placing them in a situation of legal defenselessness. Faced with this situation, Dr. Tomás Merina 's team has launched the aforementioned actions: seeking protection from the Community of Madrid and the Medical Association, and urging Icomem's legal services to act in defense of the institution. "Just as Parliament continues to maintain its oversight role in the face of a caretaker government, in the Medical Association the Assembly of Delegates must monitor what the Board of Directors is doing. The doctors of Madrid will not give up," Merina concludes.