BIR goes after Bulacan gold trader

The local gold trade may just prove to be a gold mine for government revenue collectors.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) on Thursday charged a Bulacan-based gold trader with failing to pay over P804 million in income taxes for four years.

Charged before the Department of Justice (DOJ) with multiple counts of violation of the National Internal Revenue Code was Virgilio Ipapo Ocampo, of Meycauayan, Bulacan.

Speaking at a news conference, Revenue Commissioner Kim Henares said Ocampo sold some P1.21 billion worth of refined gold to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) from 2005 to 2008.

“Despite receiving taxable income from his gold transactions with the BSP, Ocampo failed to file his quarterly and annual income tax returns during the period in question,” Henares said.

She said Ocampo owed the government P101.64 million for 2005, P218.23 million for 2006, P244.72 million for 2007 and P239.83 million for 2008.

Henares said they learned of Ocampo’s tax deficiency after the BSP furnished the tax agency with its list of individuals who had supplied gold to the central bank.

“So we’re also checking the tax records of other personalities who had gold transactions with the BSP,” she said.

In separate complaints, Henares filed tax evasion charges against scions of affluent families in Pasay City and Pangasinan for their alleged failure to settle nearly P20 million in estate taxes.

Among those charged with violation of Sections 254 and 255 of the NIRC was Juan Miguel Ongsiako,  who allegedly owed the government over P10 million for allegedly failing to pay the estate tax on a P45-million property on Roxas Boulevard that he inherited from his father who passed away in 1995.

Also charged with the same offense were the children of Gavino Vinluan and Melvin Castro who allegedly did not pay some P9.26 million in estate taxes for a 358,966-square-meter property they inherited from their parents in Labrador, Pangasinan.

“The BIR’s collection of estate taxes has not been moving over the years,” Henares said.

Since 2005, the BIR was only able to collect P850 million in estate taxes annually.

“This despite the fact that property values had gone up, the population had grown and more people had died,” she said.

Since taking over the BIR, Henares has been on a relentless drive to raise tax collections which had been anemic at best despite large transactions made and huge sums earned by businessmen, professionals like doctors and lawyers, and others who do not have their income tax withheld at source.

Her doggedness has earned her the enmity of many prominent people and nothing but praise and gratitude from President Aquino and the public at large.