Alleged rice smuggling king tagged in coin pilferage

MANILA, Philippines - Alleged big-time rice smuggler David Tan, said to be an alias of businessman Davidson Bangayan, was into pilfering of Philippine coins into China before he got involved in rice smuggling, an association of agriculture industry players said yesterday.

Representatives of the Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (SINAG) met with Senate Committee on Agriculture and Food chairperson Cynthia Villar at the Senate yesterday to air their support for efforts of the Senate to look deeper into the rice smuggling issue, including the activities of Tan.

Citing a report provided by SINAG, Villar said that Tan had been involved in smuggling of coins from the Philippines to China several years ago.

To dramatize its determination to have rice smugglers unmasked and punished, SINAG said it has raised an initial P55,000 in coins to be offered as a reward to anyone who can provide credible information that can lead to the dismantling of rice smuggling groups.

The Senate agriculture committee, which is set to resume its hearing on rice smuggling tomorrow, will have Bangayan as a resource person.

Some rice farmers and business groups and even the National Bureau of Investigation have insisted David Tan and Bangayan are one and the same person. Bangayan denied the allegation.

Villar said the camp of Bangayan had initially refused to receive the subpoena summoning him to tomorrow’s hearing because it was addressed to “Davidson Tan Bangayan” or “David Tan.”

“They (subpoena servers) had to return to the Senate and so Senate President (Franklin) Drilon and I had to prepare a new subpoena addressed to David Bangayan so that he would receive it,” Villar said.

Villar said a certain Faustino and one David Lim had also been issued subpoenas, but the latter refused to receive his.

Faustino is reportedly a woman.

She said that a third individual linked to rice smuggling, identified only as Echeverria, has been missing since the Senate began its investigation into the issue in the previous Congress.

Villar assured Bangayan and other resource persons that lawmakers would not harass them during the hearing.

“We have no preconceived notion as to what the committee report would contain later. We will just invite all of the concerned sectors and from there we will study the statements made by the witnesses and resource persons and figure out which ones are true,” Villar said.

“We’re going to the committee investigation with an open mind because it would not look good if we go in already convinced (of a certain conclusion),” she added.

Meanwhile, a consumer group has warned that shoddy work by investigators in going after the real rice smugglers in the country has left a lot of  legitimate Filipino Chinese businessmen vulnerable to extortion, ridicule and attacks.

In a statement, Coalition of FIlipino Consumers secretary general Perfecto Jaime Tagalog said concerned government agencies  need to get to the bottom of the situation as the supply of the staple to the Filipino consumer is at stake.

“We urge the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) in particular to avoid going on witch-hunts or taking shortcuts since settling for any suspect for the sake of show will only leave the pernicious acts of smuggling of rice in the country unabated,” he said.

The group added the government must be thorough in investigating, should get its act together and “stop the premature media attacks which is leaving legitimate Filipino Chinese businessmen whose only fault is having a common surname vulnerable to shame and worse extortion.” 

The DOJ initiated investigations against an alleged smuggling king named David Tan. Several Chinese names have also been dragged into the controversy. 

Sworn in

Bristling with a fresh mandate to stamp out smuggling and help the government reach its revenue goals, Customs Commissioner John Sevilla and other officials took their oath before President Aquino at Malacañang yesterday. New immigration chief Siegfred Mison also took his oath.

Sevilla took over from Ruffy Biazon who decided to resign after being implicated in the Priority Development Assistance Fund or pork barrel scam.

Aside from Sevilla, three deputies in the Bureau of Customs were also sworn in – Agaton Teodoro Uvero, deputy commissioner of the assessment and operations coordinating group; Jessie Dellosa, deputy commissioner, intelligence group; and Ariel Nepomuceno, deputy commissioner, enforcement group.

Dellosa, retired military chief of staff, replaced another former military official, Danilo Lim, who resigned a day after Aquino lambasted the BOC in his last State of the Nation Address (SONA) for its dismal performance.

Nepomuceno, meanwhile, took over Dellosa’s previous post of deputy commissioner for the enforcement group.

The BOC in Cagayan de Oro City also reported new assignments for some of its officials.

The new BOC Region 10 collector Ruby Claudia Alameda has lawyer Roswald Joseph Pague as her deputy collector.

Pague, who came from the Port of Ozamiz where he was the sub-collector for two years, replaced Marvin Mison who is back at his mother unit in Ozamiz.

Taking over the collector’s post at the Mindanao Container Terminal in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental, is Chona Sarte.

Pague said he would also try to assist the employees of the bureau in fulfilling requirements for retirement.

He said many of the employees are nearing retiring age.

As the new deputy collector, Pague said he has no information regarding rice smuggling in Northern Mindanao.

He said he only learned of the alleged activities of Tan from newspapers.

He said the BOC 10 had already stopped smuggling especially at the Tagoloan port. “We have increased our vigilance,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) said the government, not airline and shipping companies, should pay for the overtime work of Customs and immigration personnel assigned at ports.

The PCCI communicated its stand on the issue to the House of Representatives ways and means committee, which is considering bills on how BOC and BI personnel assigned at airports and seaports should be paid for overtime work.

In the past, these personnel collect fees from airline and shipping firms and divide the money among them as their overtime pay.

Some BI commissioners and officers even shared in the collection.

President Aquino has stopped the practice, as it was a source of graft and possibly extortion among the personnel involved.

In its position paper, PCCI said BOC and BI personnel assigned at ports and doing work duty are rendering public service and should be paid by their respective agencies.

 â€œWe feel that charging for instance airlines for overtime unfairly shifts the costs of performing these government services to the private airlines,” said PCCI president Miguel Varela said in a letter to Marikina Rep. Miro Quimbo, ways and means committee chairman.

He opposed a bill filed by Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali that seeks the return of the old practice of Customs and immigration officers charging airlines and shipping firms for their overtime work.

Umali was a deputy Customs commissioner before running for congressman.

Earlier, also in a letter to Quimbo, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima proposed that Customs personnel, from deputy commissioner down to the lowest-paid clerk, be reshuffled every three years to minimize corruption in their agency.

“In order to achieve the primary goal of obliterating corruption in the BOC, the sense of familiarity with one Customs location should be prevented,” she said.

“It is therefore suggested that the tenure of Customs personnel in one station be limited to a term of three years, and they will be transferred to another station for another three years, continuously until after their retirement from government service,” she said.

She said the three-year rotation should apply to deputy commissioners down to the lowest-paid clerk.

She added that her suggestions jibe with best practices recommended by the World Customs Organization.

De Lima also supported efforts in the House to rewrite the Tariff and Customs Code to make it responsive to the demands of modern trade and commerce.

“In light of public clamor over rampant corruption in the BOC, a new tariff and customs law that will address the widespread violation of the former tariff and customs code due to the incoherence and inconsistencies in its provisions should be a top priority of Congress,” she said.  – Aurea Calica, Jess Diaz, Gerry Lee Gorit