Last Dec. 9 in this space the Thompson Citizen headlined an editorial, “Giving into temptation: BRHA shoots the media messenger” in reference to the health authority’s pillorying of freelance journalist and columnist Hussain Guisti.

We concluded the editorial by urging “the BRHA … to continue to be accountable and deal with the media – all of the media … Take the high road,” we said in reference to remarks aimed at Guisti and Grassroots News at their Nov. 25, 2009 annual general meeting by then chair Duke Beardy, who suggested that “unfortunately days that could have been spent on patient care are lost to dealing with media.”

What is truly unfortunate here is not only has the BRHA chosen not to take the high road, they’ve now decided to use a Howitzer to do their shooting at Guisti, banning him for life May 27 from their meetings.

The contours of this debate take shape around Guisti’s repeated and blistering criticism of the BRHA, which are a mixture of fact, invective, investigative reporting and opinion, stirred into either a potent homeopathic – or just outright poisonous – brew, depending on how you see this debate.

Guisti is no ordinary critic or disgruntled patient. He holds bachelor of medicine and surgery degrees from King Saud University in Abha in Saudi Arabia and is currently working, he says, to obtain licensure to practice medicine in the Province of Manitoba, a credential he was lacking when he was passed over several years ago when he applied for the job as vice-president of medical, a senior administrative job, with the BRHA.

His curriculum vitae also includes entries on master’s degrees in public health and science from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and working for more than three years as a sub-editor at the English-language Saudi Gazette in Makkah.

Much of the information he has ferreted out about the BRHA is in the public domain – or can be obtained – if one is willing to work for it, and he clearly is. The BRHA had to deal with about 150 Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) requests for information last year. Guisti filed more than other individual.

In June 2008, a FIPPA request by him led to media throughout Manitoba picking up the story Thompson General Hospital had treated 27 cases of necrotizing fasciitis, commonly known as flesh-eating disease, over the last three years, a number far greater than statistical norms would predict. Guisti also published a publicly available list of senior BRHA staff salaries last August, which was read locally with more than passing interest.

The board, which received legal advice on the matter, may be within its legal rights to bar Guisti from its meetings. Time will tell. Under its General Bylaw No. 1, there is to be “reasonable opportunity” for members of the public “to make appropriate representations to the board in a fair and responsible manner.”

But it does not spell out a right of public access to meetings other than an annual general meeting. And Section 19 of The Regional Health Authorities Act, which is the governing legislation for the BRHA, speaks only to “an annual meeting, which shall be open to the public, at the time and in accordance with the requirements prescribed in the regulations.”

Just because something is legal, of course, is not always synonymous with it being ethically or morally right. Such is the case here. The BRHA’s sledgehammer approach is ham-handed at best, outrageously arrogant at worst, and in all events, counterproductive.

Readers can decide for themselves if they believe Guisti is being banned from BRHA meetings for his muckraking journalism, or rather as Lloyd Flett, the new chair of the board says, because he was interruptive or disruptive. Flett, a former mayor of the Norway House Community Council, who is currently employed as the administrator of the Norway House Community Council, said on May 31 Guisti once entered a meeting during the opening prayer, which he said the board found disruptive, and another time he helped himself to some taxpayer-provided BRHA lunch at an adjacent table in the boardroom. Guisti denied May 31 ever availing himself of a free lunch.

An earlier explanation by Flett offered May 28 – the day after they unanimous resolution of the board banning Guisti – said they felt “compelled to act” because “ongoing, inaccurate portrayals related to BRHA operations and staff have affected also their ability to conduct work and serve the communities in the region” and the situation got so bad that board members were reluctant to speak out at meeting for fear of being “misrepresented.”

Take your pick.

In some ways, as we first said last December, it matters not so much if Guisti is a high-minded public crusader or a loose cannon with a personal axe to grind. That is not for us to judge. What matters more, we would suggest, is the institutional response of the BRHA to its critics.

While it must be frustrating, annoying and even maddening at times to have to deal with Guisti’s barrage of questions and published articles, we believe the BRHA needs to have a measured and tempered response.

In May 2009, the BRHA used the Winnipeg law firm of Pitblado Barristers & Solicitors to have lawyer Tracey Epp send Guisti a cease-and-desist letter in reference to material published in some of his columns. The David-and-Goliath optics was immediate: Tom Brodbeck took up Guisti’s cause in his Winnipeg Sun column. The opposition raised the issue in the legislature.

In May 2010, the BRHA decided to ban Guisti from meetings for life.

Brilliant. As baseball legend Yogi Berra once said in a famous malapropism, “This is like déjà vu all over again.”

Only worse this time.