A revenue shortfall has plagued ports in the regions that are under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Customs (BOC) during the last few months in office of Alberto Lina as Customs chief.
Out of a total shortfall of nearly P50 billion in the first six months of 2016, ports in the provinces accounted for more than P6 billion.
Data from the Customs bureau itself showed that the following ports suffered shortfalls in the hundreds of millions of pesos in the first six months of the year as Lina wound down his task as BOC chief—San Fernando in La Union province with a shortfall of P520.5 million; Legazpi City, P73.1 million; Iloilo City, P274 million; Cebu City, P621.2 million; Tacloban City, P70.3 million; Surigao City, P8.6 million; Cagayan De Oro City, P808.6 million; Davao City, P1.23 billion; Subic, P2.13 billion; Clark, 38.4 million; and Aparri in Cagayan province, P252.3 million.
All ports under the supervision of the BOC were unable to hit revenue targets in April and May.
BOC records showed that under Lina, the agency was able to collect only P190.3 billion out of its P238.3 billion target.
Weeks before Lina stepped out of office, then incoming President Duterte named the BOC as among the three most corrupt agencies in the government, along with the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Land Transportation Office.
Last month, Mr. Duterte ordered new Customs Commissioner Nicanor Faeldon to rid the agency of corrupt officials and personnel.
“I already have the raw information (on corrupt BOC officials) but I still have to validate it … I hope Faeldon would do his thing and stop corruption in Customs,” the President said, adding that unscrupulous Customs officials and employees have “long lived in luxury.”
In April alone, the bureau posted a deficit of P8.47 billion, with import duties and taxes collected reaching only P32.45 billion as against its monthly target of P40.92 billion.
During that month, two ports outside of Metro Manila suffered hundreds of millions of pesos in losses—port of Limay, Bataan province at P1.36 billion and Batangas port, P500.6 million.
The losses continued in May, reaching a total of P8.8 billion.
Collections from Limay and Batangas ports, along with ports in Metro Manila, account for close to 85 percent of monthly Customs revenue.
The port of Zamboanga City was the lone port to exceed its target of P84.6 million, with collections reaching P109.4 million for the first six months of the year.
With the agency’s shortfall, Mr. Duterte had stressed that Faeldon has a lot of spadework to do to reverse the trend for the rest of 2016.
In Cagayan de Oro City, the Northern Mindanao office of the BOC said it is working double time to prevent smuggling, particularly of drugs.
In a statement, the BOC regional office said it is working with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) on the anti-drug campaign.
PDEA agents and K-9 units would be tapped in ports. In its statement, the BOC said it also wants to help in the drug war aside from fulfilling its main duty of preventing smuggling and helping raise revenues for the government.
Rudy Claudia Alameda, Customs collector for Cagayan de Oro City, is carrying out a directive from the Customs intelligence group, then headed by former general Jessie Dellosa, to form an anti-smuggling and anti-corruption team in Cagayan de Oro. With a report from Jigger J. Jerusalem, Inquirer Mindanao