Gloria Arroyo wants more rice imports; raps filed vs smugglers

MANILA, Philippines — Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo yesterday called for more rice importation to bring down the price of the staple, which some Mindanao congressmen claim is selling for as much as P70 per kilo in some areas in the Southern Philippines.

“At this point in time, they have to import… the most important thing is to be able to import rice and make it arrive before October,” she told reporters in Pampanga when asked what the government should do to bring down consumer prices.

She said in her talks with her constituents and poor people in other areas, she found out they are most concerned about the high price of rice.

As this developed, the Bureau of Customs (BOC) yesterday announced the filing with the Department of Justice (DOJ) of a P142-million “large scale agricultural smuggling” complaint against importers and brokers of rice and white sugar shipments.

Arroyo said she discussed rice importation on Wednesday with Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea in the course of the House appropriations committee hearing on the proposed P6.8-billion budget for the Office of the President next year.

She added that Medialdea told him that he was going straight to the Palace after the hearing to attend a meeting on rice importation.

Asked if she was in favor of the proposed abolition of the National Food Authority (NFA), the agency authorized to import rice, she said she was “neither here nor there” about it.

However, she said the imposition of tariff on the importation of the staple could result in the NFA’s abolition.

“Then, maybe NFA can be abolished because then it will be liberalized,” she said.

The House of Representatives has passed its version of the bill replacing volume restrictions on rice importation with tariff.

As for other counter-inflation measures she and other House leaders have proposed, Arroyo said, “We have already given our suggestions because the main sources of inflation were identified during our meeting with the economic managers (three weeks ago).”

She said Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez has informed her that restrictions on the importation of fish and meat would be relaxed, instead of exempting them from tariff as proposed in the House.

Smuggling case

In a statement, the BOC announced the filing of a criminal complaint against the officers of Sta. Rosa Farms, namely Jomerito Soliman, Dolores Opancia, Mary Grace Cayanan, Marileen Avañez and its licensed Customs broker Diosdado Santiago.

Sta. Rosa Farms reportedly imported 50,000 sacks of rice, with a total value of P120,707,596.00, without the requisite NFA import permit.

Also sued by the BOC for sugar smuggling were officers of Red Star Rising Corp.: Dante Lunar, Leonardo Mallari, Richel Paranete Llanes, August Presillas Templado and Bernie Abrina Rubia.

Red Star reportedly illegally imported white sugar with an aggregate value of P21,558,561, including duties and taxes.

The three shipments of Red Star were reportedly declared in the manifests as packaging materials, kitchen utensils and kraft paper.

The sugar shipments were not supported by any import permit from the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA). The sugar products came from Thailand and arrived at the Port of Manila on different dates in July.

Customs Commissioner Isidro Lapeña has repeatedly stressed that large-scale smuggling of agricultural products constitutes economic sabotage, which would be severely dealt with by the bureau.

As the administration searches for ways to stabilize rice supply, minority lawmakers have threatened to block the 2019 budget of beleaguered Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol. The lawmakers also issued the same threat to Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III. They said the two officials should be denied of their budget requests unless they could fully explain the controversies hounding them.

“We will seek the deferment of the plenary consideration and approval of the Department of Agriculture (DA) and Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) budgets if we are not satisfied with the answers of the two secretaries,” Minority Leader Danilo Suarez said yesterday.

He said if Piñol would insist on keeping his job despite the raging rice crisis, “he should tell the representatives of the people how he intends to deal with this nagging problem.”

“This is principally a production issue, for which the DA is responsible. The agriculture secretary is supposed to ensure that we have sufficient supply of rice and other agricultural products. He cannot blame other people for his failure to do his job,” he said.

He added that legalizing rice smuggling is not the solution. “It’s plain stupidity to call for legalized smuggling of products. They are not solving the problem. They’re looking at something else,” Suarez stressed.

Resign calls

Deputy Minority Leader and Buhay Rep. Lito Atienza reiterated his call for Piñol and NFA administrator Jason Aquino to “resign if they cannot do their job.”

He said the rice crisis has been prevailing “for more than a year now, and yet they failed to ease the situation and could not even offer solutions.”

Atienza recalled that early last year, Piñol, Aquino and Cabinet Secretary Leoncio Evasco Jr., who heads the NFA council, quarreled over rice supply and importation.

“The President even dismissed an undersecretary of Secretary Evasco on suspicion of corruption on rice importation,” he said.

Two other deputies of Suarez, Reps. Aniceto Bertiz III and Anthony Bravo of party-lists Acts-OFW and Coop-Natco, have issues on alleged fund misuse by Bello.

Bertiz said a Commission on Audit (COA) report shows that of the P2.5 billion Congress had allocated for employment assistance for displaced employees and overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), Bello used P1.9 billion for “other programs and administrative expenses.”

“Only P600 million was spent to help jobless workers… the purpose for which the P2.5 billion was appropriated. Secretary Bello is responsible for the diversion of the P1.9 billion since the funds were placed under DOLE-Osec (office of the secretary),” he said.

He said the budget law authorized the labor secretary to use only five percent of the funds for administrative cost.

“Why did Secretary Bello spend 75 percent of the budget for assistance for jobless Filipinos on administrative expenses at a time when so many of our financially strapped workers could have directly benefitted from this huge amount?” Bertiz asked.

In the course of a budget hearing on Thursday, the DOLE chief denied he misused or diverted the money but could not tell how much he spent for administrative expenses or what “other programs” the P1.9 billion was used for. He promised to submit a detailed report to the appropriations committee.

The employment assistance funds were to be distributed equitably among the country’s 16 regions, but Bertiz said the Ilocos provinces and the Bicol region did not get even a centavo.

This means that the DOLE “made it appear that there were no unemployed and underemployed workers in those two regions last year,” he said.

“Other regions were given as small as P40,000 and P90,000. What were clearly bloated, as shown in the COA report, were the administrative expenses. For instance, for Metro Manila, administrative costs amounted to P318 million, while program expenses totaled only P67.3 million,” he said. – With  Evelyn Macairan, Louise Maureen Simeon