The Bureau of Customs raised a total of P68.5 billion during the first quarter of the year, but the revenue collections were P7.83 billion short of the Department of Finance-attached agency’s target of P76.3 billion for the period.
The Philippines may have reached investment-grade status but its corporate watchdog, the Securities and Exchange Commission, is languishing at sub-par payroll levels and now faces an exodus of key officers.
Malacañang is standing by Customs Commissioner Rozzano “Ruffy” Biazon despite the massive smuggling of petroleum products into the country that industry leaders claim is costing the government at least P30 billion in forgone revenue annually.
Phoenix Petroleum Philippines Inc. defended itself from allegations of oil smuggling on Wednesday, saying that the Department of Justice has dismissed smuggling charges filed against the company under the Bureau of Customs’s Run After the Smugglers (RATS) campaign.
A ranking official of the Volunteers against Crime and Corruption (VACC) believes that irregularities and “old hands” at the Bureau of Customs (BoC) are delaying the bidding process for the P442.3-million National Single Window (NSW) Phase 2 Project, a report from Radyo INQUIRER 990 AM said recently.
Used-car importers in Cagayan Valley have asked Customs Commissioner Ruffy Biazon to allow the release of more than 200 second-hand cars and vans that arrived in Port Irene, Cagayan, on Monday, allegedly in defiance of a Supreme Court ruling upholding a 2001 executive order banning the importation of used vehicles into the country.
The Bureau of Customs has seized two container vans of counterfeit signature fabrics from Thailand and fake food seasoning from China, estimated to be worth at least P316.2 million.
The Bureau of Customs has yet to disclose the Department of Finance-attached agency’s total revenue collections for 2012.
The Bureau of Customs filed on Thursday smuggling charges against two businessmen at the Department of Justice months after they were caught illegally bringing into the country onions and garlic from China valued at a whopping P19 million.
Bureau of Customs Commissioner Rufino Biazon said that ivory products have long been in the Philippine market despite an international ban on ivory.
The Senate committee on agriculture has ordered the top Indian executive of the company that shipped P450-million worth of rice to the country to show cause why he shouldn’t be cited for contempt after he told the inquiry that the bags of rice were unloaded in Subic only for transshipment, not for domestic sale in the Philippines.
Bureau of Customs Commissioner Ruffy Biazon on Tuesday said that he wanted his agency to be viewed as a “trade facilitation agency.”
