BIR examiner who failed lifestyle check dismissed

The Office of the Ombudsman dismissed yesterday another public official from the service, this time an official of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) who allegedly acquiring various properties he could not have bought with his "salary and other lawful income" alone.

Accountant-lawyer Arnel Bernardo, a BIR examiner, was found guilty by Ombudsman Simeon Marcelo of dishonesty and grave misconduct after he failed to explain the source of the assets he acquired since joining the bureau in 1979.

He was the second government official fired for an administrative offense after Public Works and Highways Undersecretary Salvador Pleyto, who denied having acquired ill-gotten wealth and claimed he was being persecuted.

Marcelo ordered BIR Commissioner Guillermo Parayno to carry out the administrative sanction as soon as possible.

Bernardo’s retirement benefits were also forfeited and he was perpetually barred from holding a position in government or any government-owned or controlled corporations.

"Bernardo has been found to have acquired during his incumbency as a public officer property and money which are manifestly out of proportion to his salary and other lawful income," Ombudsman spokesman Ernesto Nocos said.

Probers disclosed that from 1979 to 2001, Bernardo acquired P20.9 million in assets, but a computation of his supposed total income only amounted to P2.4 million, which "roughly represents nine percent of the total acquisition cost."

Investigators also discovered that Bernardo brought along his wife and four children in his foreign travels for two years, from 1995 to 1997, but failed to present proof he was financially capable to "support their frequent foreign travels."

"Bernardo claimed that during his incumbency, he was a recipient of a donation worth P8 million, but could not present documentary proof of the donation nor evidence as to who the donor was," the Ombudsman’s statement read.

Among Bernardo’s other alleged ill-gotten properties are a four-story commercial building in Manila he bought for P750,000 in 1985 and a piece of residential land worth P800,000 that he reportedly purchased in 1988.

Bernardo also allegedly bought a P1-million house in 1999 and another residence worth P1.8 million in 2001, apart from three other residential properties he acquired in 1989, 1990 and 1995 which were worth P235,420, P230,000 and P4.1 million, respectively.

A review of Bernardo’s declared assets showed, however, that he could not have acquired them since his income from 1980 to 1985 only amounted to P107,000 and from 1996 to 1998, he earned a total of P99,000.