Gov’t to penalize traders using ports as ‘warehouse’
Cabinet Secretary Rene Almendras. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines – Malacañang on Wednesday reiterated that the government will be imposing penalties and fines for cargo containers left at the Port of Manila five days after being cleared for transfer.
Cabinet Secretary Rene Almendras said that starting September 8, authorities will be transferring containers left at the port for more than 30 days, despite being cleared by port authorities, to Subic.
“On October 1, we will start charging P5,000 per container (per day for cargoes not pulled out from the ports within the five-day period). If your cargo is moved to Subic, effective October 1, you will still be charged P5,000,” he added.
The “drastic steps,” he said, were taken to further decongest ports, in addition to other measures already undertaken.
Incentives
Almendras, however, said that they would also “reward” those who are cooperative.
“If you will go to the ports and withdraw cargo on Sunday and Monday morning (for the next two weeks) we have a two-week special privilege window. Your truck will be given a special tag and a special permit that will allow you to move beyond the 24-hour truck lanes into what’s known as the last mile (routes taking them to their warehouse),” he said.
The Secretary said it was in response to cargo owners complaining that the 24-hour truck lanes were not enough since the streets going to their warehouses were still covered by the truck ban.
If things go their way and 16,000 containers are transferred out of the port, congestion can be solved within two weeks, he added.
Not a warehouse
“The ports were not designed to be your warehouse or your storage facility,” said Almendras, who is the head of the Cabinet cluster for port decongestion.
“As it is, the price of leaving your container at the port is cheaper than occupying a warehouse in Metro Manila. So maybe that’s why people are leaving their containers at the port. But the point is, we need port space because we have a lot more cargo coming in during the last three months of the year,” he explained.
On Tuesday morning, Almendras and other officials met at Malacanang to tackle port problems. It was Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. who announced hours later that the cluster agreed to impose the new rules.
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