27 customs collectors kicked upstairs, says Biazon

Customs Commissioner Ruffy Biazon: They were elevated to DOF
INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—They were not demoted but “elevated,” Customs Commissioner Ruffy Biazon said Thursday of the 27 district collectors whose reassignments were temporarily blocked by a Manila court after 15 of them protested their removal from their current posts.

“They were elevated to the Department of Finance,” said Biazon who was at the Department of Justice on Thursday.

Asked if this meant the district collectors had not been demoted then, he said the court would decide this, as he insisted that his reassignment order was “valid.”

Biazon said that five of the district collectors who did not join the 15 who had sought the temporary TRO from the Manila Regional Trial Court had complied with his reassignment order and were now reporting to the Customs Policy Research Office (CPRO) in the Department of Finance, the Bureau of Customs’ parent agency.