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The legality of the P402-million reward to Customs officials led by
Customs Commissioner Napoleon Morales for allegedly exceeding their
collection target in 2006 was questioned Monday at a joint Senate
hearing.
Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, chairman of the Senate
Committee on Public Services, said customs officials should return
their “reward” and even be prosecuted should it be proven that
there was a misapplication of the Lateral Attrition Law.
The law, meant to enhance revenue collections,
allows the grant of reward for those who exceed their collection
target, and provides sanctions against those who fail to meet it.
Jesus Arranza, president of the Federation of
Philippine Industries, submitted to Enrile and Sen. Francis Escudero,
chairman of the Senate Committee on Ways and Means, documents
showing that the Customs bureau exceeded its target for 2006 by
getting P2 billion in advance tariff payments from oil firms.
“This allowed the Bureau of Customs to exceed
its collection target, and then rewarded themselves with P402
million for this accomplishment,” Arranza said.
Enrile said the law sought to reward only real
collection efforts, not advance payment of taxes.
“There is no law authorizing the advance
payment of taxes because that distorts the revenues for the
following year,” he said.
Assistant Secretary Antonio Villar of the
Presidential Anti-Smuggling Group gave media a partial list of
Customs officials who received the P402-million reward. The list
showed that Morales got the highest reward with almost P5.3 million.
A certain Bernardo Sales got P908,361, Director Corazon Azana
received a reward of P608,438, while acting Director Liwayway
Mendoza was rewarded with P522,476.
Escudero said the disparity in the “rewards”
is probable because the Lateral Attrition Law provides a bigger
share for those who are receiving bigger salaries.
“I voted against this because my idea was that
those in the field should get a bigger share of the reward than
those receiving higher pays,” Escudero said.
Arranza said that Morales qualifies to receive a
reward under the Lateral Attrition Law should the Bureau of Customs
exceed its collection target.
“But the list of those received rewards
included those who were not entitled to them under the Attrition
Law,” he said.
The list included security guards, drivers,
janitors, clerks, clerical assistants, warehousemen, messengers, and
print machine operators, all with the Office of the Commissioner. A
print machine operator, Felisa Regis, got P72,862 while driver
Oliver Jhun Pablo got P51,439.
Enrile said that the attrition law’s reward
system does not include casuals, janitors and consultants. But more
than the enumeration of those who are entitled to reward, Enrile
said that the more important thing is to determine if the customs
officials are really entitled to rewards out of advance payment of
tariffs.
He said the two Senate committees would look
further into this reward system in the next hearings, with the
Commission on Audit as one of the invited agencies.
-- Efren L. Danao
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