12 people face criminal raps over Subic smuggling
The Presidential Anti Smuggling Group (PASG) has recommended the filing of criminal charges against four Bureau of Customs (BoC) officers and eight individuals from different private corporations at the Department of Justice (DoJ) in connection with the multi-billion peso oil smuggling at Subic Bay Free Port in 2004.
PASG head Undersecretary Antonio Villar Jr. said the recommendation was an offshoot of the preliminary investigation conducted by PASG chief for operations and National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Deputy Director Edmund Arugay that found the suspects liable for shortchanging the government in the form of unpaid taxes.
Among those charged were Delia Morala, Formal Principal Customs Appraiser of Section 11, Formal Entry Division, Bureau of Customs,
Villar said the investigation clearly showed that the accused appeared to have worked in connivance to undervalue the total number of imported oil cargo on board MT Port Louis from 26,508.50 metric tons to only 12,657.41 metric tons on
It was also suspicious that all the suspects failed to present the necessary documents related to the oil importation when they were asked to do so at the onset of the investigation, an act seen as evasive in nature.
Arugay said the shipment was actually covered by three bills of lading and not just two as reported and that the cargo vessel chartered by the consignee has a capacity of 37,000 metric tons.
“Assuming without accepting that the alleged documents are correct, then only around one third of the vessel’s capacity had been utilized. Ironic, too, is the fact that the consignee opted to use a big vessel rather than a smaller one, thus incurring much higher amount of freighter cost,” Arugay said. – Paolo Romero
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