A LAWMAKER yester- Ievenuet i.
ncludins Den- serqices and inJTastrucfu re
day asked the g-ovem-
alties f or improp'eri"m'port
ment to look into the al-
declarations.
leged cortuption between
Buhay Hayaang Yurn-
several big steel manu- abong (Buhay) Rep. Lito
facture* ard officials of Atienza said ttre lrnt ta"
the Bureau of Customs
rcvenues that could have
(BoC) who may have de- gone to the governrnent,s
prived the government of coffer is enotiqh to suDDort
billions oi pesos in tax the adrninistrition's l#i,
quiry on the possible al-
Ptoiects. leged misdeclaia tion in the
"Instead of inboducing
importation documents
new tax relomls tc' raise submitted by the big steel
levenue for the gOvem- manulacfurels.
ment's social services and
Theprobewill cover the
infrasbuchlre programs, real declared value of the
the government should be imported billets over the
looFing into *re issue of past tenyea$or tirneswhen
t smuggling at BoC, espe- the steelrnakers reDorted lv
cialy sreel," said Atienza declared differerittv ani
who asked the BoC to im- also paid a lowet tai.
plement the pre-shipment It will abo fook into the
irupection ofall cargb vans imported Eteel billets from
coming into the countrv. several countdes that al-
"TheCustoms Modem- legedly displayed trig dis-
ization and Tariff Act crepancies in terms of size.
(CMTA1 was passed in description
arld volume,
2015 but it was'never im- showing clear misdedara-
plemented the pre-inspec- tion, and thus improper
bon provision specified in mxes Pald.
Sec.,140-that container Last year, giant ciga-
vans should be inspected rette maker Mighty Co-rp.
a t their ports of origin. The paid nearly p40 biilion to
huge amount of tax reve- the Bureaubf Intemal Rev-
nues the go\rerrDlcnt js los- enue (BIR) to settle tax de-
ing due to this malpractice ficiencies as part of a com-
could be used to fund in- promise deal that allowed
f rastructure proiects under the company to walk from
the President's'Brritd criminal complaints filed
Build, Build," proqram, before the D+artment of
particuJarly tho# thit are
Justice (DoJ).
intended fo alleviate the Last month, President
counhy's hansportation Rodrigo Du terte specfical-
system to ease the com- ly eyed the BoC ?or ram-
muters dailVburden."
- said paJlt conupfion, and axed
Atienza. 64 top officials and em-
It was reported that ployees of therevenue<ol-
Dante Jimenez, the chair- lecting agency allesedlv
man of Presidential Anti- Iinled to unetliical pr"ac tii-
Corilption Commission es,
(P.ACC),codiuned itsin- Ryan Ponce pacpaco
P€,cit