No break from corruption at Customs on Holy Week

MANILA, Philippines—They did not even break for Holy Week.

Corruption at the Bureau of Customs went on unabated “even shortly before, during and right after the Holy Week” from April 21 to 25 with the giving out of “tara,” or grease money, to examiners and other BOC personnel by brokers and importers seeking the prompt release of their misdeclared and undervalued cargoes.

This was disclosed to the Inquirer over the weekend by a top customs official who said that “old hands” at the Department of Finance-attached agency were mostly behind the corruption.

“It was business as usual for these people, walang pangilin (they wouldn’t abstain) even during this period,” said the official, who asked not to be named for lack of authority to speak to the media.

The source said this was proof that President Aquino’s stern warning to corrupt bureau personnel to shape up had been largely ignored.

Both the President and Customs Commissioner John P. Sevilla, a former finance undersecretary, were reportedly incensed by the under-the-table deals between some importers and bureau personnel.

Misdeclared and undervalued imports cost the government billions of pesos in lost revenue.

Last March, Customs Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence Jessie Dellosa told this paper that “tara” and other corrupt practices at the agency had declined after the bureau’s new leadership began stricter monitoring of transactions in October.

“Before, it was a grand fiesta. Today, it’s just a regular fiesta,” said Dellosa, a former chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

Dellosa noted that the payoff schedule for the tara was moved to Tuesday afternoon from Friday, when the bribes would be distributed. “The so-called Friday Club has become Happy Tuesdays,” he said.

The tara could range from P500 to millions of pesos depending on the number of container vans and their contents being brought in, he said.

For her part, a Metro Manila-based woman trader who deals with the bureau said “some customs old-timers, not the importers, should be blamed for the misdeclaration and undervaluation of incoming cargo.”

The trader said that “some bureau frontline personnel, mainly examiners, were the ones who taught our brokers how to misdeclare and undervalue our imports.”

“From these examiners, our brokers learned how to elude payment of the right duties and taxes by substituting lower dutiable rates of commodities,” said the source, who added that “negotiations, resulting in payoffs, usually take at least eight hours.”

In separate interviews, two other customs players confirmed the woman trader’s disclosure.

Last week, Sevilla told a Makati City business forum that all the agency’s transactions with importers would be conducted electronically by June next year to promote transparency and curb corruption at the bureau.

“When everything is digital, there’s much less room for corruption. When everything is digital, it’s a lot easier to be transparent,” he said, adding that he also wanted the public to “get used to a much higher degree of disclosure.”

Sevilla said the bureau would work for the “maximized use of X-ray machines at the country’s ports; the sale and disposition of abandoned, seized and forfeited imported goods within two months of the resolution of legal proceedings; fully electronic record-keeping for customs bonded warehouses; the preshipment inspection of goods; a vessel tracking system; and the examination of at least two percent of all containers within 72 hours upon arrival in the country.

Sevilla said that in the first quarter of the year, the bureau conducted a number of “high-profile raids and seizures” of misdeclared and undervalued cargoes.