No more political accommodations, says BIR

Faced with a runaway deficit, the Arroyo administration said there will be more political accommodations when it moves to complete the reforms at the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR).

The government, however, has opted to remain ambiguous about what it intends to do with its biggest revenue-collecting agency despite pressure from its creditors to overhaul the BIR and start fresh with a new revenue body.

Finance Secretary Jose Isidro Camacho told reporters that the BIR had already begun the "quiet process" of evaluating its personnel after the bureau held the entire country hostage during the first half of the year, ostensibly to protest the reforms instituted by then commissioner Rene Bañez.

According to Camacho, the most that the BIR could do at this point is to ensure that "no one gets promoted without merit."

Camacho said this is what the BIR should be doing in the first place but he said the hands of the Department of Finance (DOF) are tied unless Congress acts on several proposals to overhaul the bureau.

Camacho also said that contrary to public criticisms, the BIR under commissioner Guillermo Parayno is determined to go after large corporate taxpayers that have not been up front with their tax payments.

"We are going after big ticket items that should have been collected but for one reason or the other, we not being collected," Camacho said."

Parayno said the BIR expects to get an additional P1.5 billion in tax arrears by the end of the year, mostly from banks, insurance companies and private corporations. – Des Ferriols