Cleaning up the BIR

Taxes go to the construction of roads and school buildings, the installation of safe water and irrigation facilities, the provision of health care to millions of Filipinos. Taxes well spent mean efficient public services, and increased revenue collection normally means improved or wider provision of these services. Responsible citizens pay the right amount of taxes on time, and they are the first to be outraged when public funds are misspent. The people have a stake in seeing to it that each individual or corporate entity pays the right amount of taxes.

Not all taxpayers, however, are responsible citizens. And not all re-venue collectors are efficient or honest. A special report of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism showed that corruption continues to plague the Bureau of Internal Revenue, whose collections account for about 80 percent of the government's total tax earnings. A retired senior re-venue examiner gave some details about "revenue-sharing" schemes among unscrupulous collectors. The report also gave an idea of how much of taxpayers' money goes to government coffers and how much ends up in BIR personnel's pockets.

Allegations of corruption at the BIR are nothing new. Successive admi-nistrations have made noises about ridding the government's top revenue earner of corrupt personnel. Revenue collectors have repeatedly been told to shape up and improve the tax take. Opposition to new taxes often stems from perceptions that the BIR is not doing its job, that before the tax base is broadened or new taxes imposed, the bureau must first improve its efficiency and clean up its act.

Cleaning up, however, isn't going to be easy among public servants who have known how lucrative corruption can be. The PCIJ report noted that there is resistance to reform at the BIR, with even its computerization program hitting a snag. Some citizens, frustrated over the slow pace of reforms, have banded together to serve as watchdogs of BIR operations. There are other proposals to make re-venue collectors more accountable. The administration can do its part by minimizing opportunities for corruption at the bureau, apart from intensifying its campaign to weed out corrupt BIR personnel.