Philippine Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III is urging the Bureau of Customs (BOC) and Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) to file charges at once against the proven owners, as well as the government officials in cahoots with them, of the P2.2 billion worth of smuggled and counterfeit tobacco products and apparel seized in a series of government raids conducted recently.
“If the evidence warrants, I urge the BIR and BOC to file the appropriate charges in court as soon as possible,” Dominguez said in a statement.
The “hot” goods, along with endangered monitor lizards, were seized by customs agents in separate operations last week, according to BOC in a series of reports to mother agency Department of Finance (DOF).
In one report, BOC said over P2 billion worth of smuggled and counterfeit tobacco products that contained fake tax stamps were seized by customs operatives in raids in Pampanga and the cities of General Santos and Zamboanga in Mindanao.
Dominguez said he wants government officials found to have been involved in these tax evasion bids to be included in the charge sheets together with the erring entities.
“They (BOC and BIR) should speed up their investigations and also look into the possible involvement of bureaucrats acting as protectors of these large-scale tax evasion attempts,” Dominguez said.
BOC also conducted separate operations at two buildings in Pasay City last week, where customs teams captured some P200 million worth of assorted counterfeit clothing with brand names like Adidas, Nike, Vans, Lacoste, Jag, Wrangler, Under Armour, Superman, and NBA.
Last week, too, BOC uncovered an attempt to smuggle out of the country three live monitor lizards hidden in the casing of a computer’s CPU. The lizards were discovered when the casing passed through an x-ray machine at the FedEx Cargo Warehouse in Ninoy Aquino International Airport.
The sender, a Dennis Sarmiento of Cebu City, is facing charges of violating Republic Act No. 9147, or the Wildlife Resources Conservation and Protection Act. The consignee was listed as a certain Kabren Jhason of California, according to BOC.
Meanwhile, members of the agency’s team were reportedly refused entry into one of the warehouses leased by tobacco manufacturer Mighty Corp. during a tax compliance verification campaign done earlier by BIR in Zamboanga City.
In a separate report to Dominguez, BIR said members of its team were barred from the warehouse premises despite a valid mission order issued by its regional office.
This prompted the BIR regional office in Zamboanga City to recommend a nationwide verification drive in all regions of the country, with mission orders emanating from the national office in Manila.
This is to “ensure proper verification of the authenticity of internal revenue stamps (IRS) affixed in various cigarette brands and whether the concerned cigarette manufacturers have duly paid the required excise taxes on the articles being distributed to their various sales outlets.”
Mighty executive vice president and spokesperson Oscar Barrientos, in a statement, said the company is “willing to open all its warehouses to cooperate with the BOC for seizure of fake cigarettes should any be found within its premises.”
He reiterated Mighty’s position that the company is “not in the business of producing fake cigarette products as its own local brands are well-accepted by its customers.”
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
