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By William B. Depasupil, Reporter
The Presidential Anti-Smuggling Group (PASG)
wants petroleum companies to open their books to authorities to
check if the firms are involved in oil smuggling, which costs
government billions of pesos annually.
In a Senate hearing last week, Sen. Francis
Escudero said oil smuggling costs the government at least P16
billion in foregone tax revenues every year. He based the estimate
on the discrepancy between the volume of oil imported and the
quantity taxed—a difference of about 4 billion liters.
“It’s time for these oil firms to be
transparent in their business,” said Undersecretary Antonio Villar
Jr., head of the Presidential Anti-Smuggling Group. “They must be
transparent so there will be no reason for others to suspect they
are short-changing the government in terms of taxes and duties from
their oil importation.”
Senators Joker Arroyo and Mar Roxas 2nd recently
urged authorities to inspect the financial records of oil firms and
oil importers before the energy summit set late this month to
address the issues about the soaring prices of petroleum.
Lawmakers said oil firms should be upfront about
their pricing and shipments to determine if their profit margins are
reasonable and if proper duties and taxes were paid to the
government.
Villar said this is one way to find out if oil
importers are fair in the conduct of their business stressing that
those charged with oil smuggling appeared to have been defrauding
the government of taxes and duties long before the group’s expose
on rampant oil smuggling.
At least four of those charged were forced to
pay back taxes worth nearly P1 billion.
Villar said the senators’ proposal was timely
and needed to avoid a repeat of what appeared to be a long-time and
unhampered operation of oil smuggling syndicates.
“The PASG will do its share in the effort to
ensure that oil importers are doing business fairly,” he added.
“But authorities should likewise cooperate in this endeavor
through technical means one of which is by scrutinizing the books of
these oil importers.”
Another kind of smuggling
Meanwhile, the Bureau of Customs also ordered an
investigation of companies and of bonded warehouses involved in
illegal diversion of goods that entered the country tax-free under
the warehousing scheme.
Customs Commissioner Napoleon Morales has
ordered Director Nicasio Radovan, new chief of the enforcement and
security service, after Customs police tracked down several
container vans of woven fabrics diverted to the warehouse of Best
Print Textile Finishing Corp. in Barangay Iba, Meycauayan, Bulacan.
Another operation also resulted to the discovery
of two 40-footer vans containing resin illegally diverted to a
warehouse inside Sterling Compound, also in Barangay Iba, and to a
warehouse in Valenzuela City.
Investigation showed that the resin recovered in
Meycauayan was supposed to have been delivered to a bonded warehouse
licensed to Global Trade Asia Services in Alabang, Muntinlupa City.
Radovan said he will ask for “visitorial
power” in order to expand the scope of their investigation.
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