Mystery of missing ship

Only David Copperfield could’ve pulled the trick – or so it seemed. At dusk last Christmas Eve the huge cargo ship MV Great Faith disappeared into thin air from the Port of Cebu, with its contraband of 30,000 sacks of smuggled rice. The hand was quicker than the eye. Nobody, not even the Customs men guarding the confiscated ship round the clock, saw what happened. But Filipino government officials must really be infinitely better at hocus-pocus than the celebrated American magician. In the ensuing investigation of the disappearance, they are colluding with each other to

prevent the filing of criminal charges against higher-ups, only against the proverbial small fry.

Mystery had surrounded the ship even before the great escape. NBI agents looking into the case found out that Cebu-Customs deputy collector Santiago Maravillas had ordered the seizure of the smuggled rice on Sept. 13, 2001 although he had no authority to do so. He was feuding at that time with his superior, district collector Roberto Sacramento, and wanted to prove his worth with their bosses in Manila. Their squabbling had in fact reached the halls of the Senate where they each had padrinos; Finance Sec. Jose Isidro Camacho was even questioned during his confirmation hearings for disciplining them.

Weeks later on Oct. 2 Sacramento trashed Maravillas’s unauthorized order to confiscate. On the mere say-so of the ship owner, he declared that "documents were in order and the rice was of local origin." Sacramento did not bother to summon his own men from the Customs Intelligence and Investigation Service, who had gotten word of the incoming contraband from abroad. Nor did he ask those from the Enforcement and Security Service, who were the first to board the MV Great Faith and ask for authenticity papers that the ship captain could not produce.

Word of the feuding and remanded confiscation reached Customs chief Titus Villanueva in Manila. A quick review of the reports showed that the rice was indeed smuggled. Under Customs rules, Villanueva ordered the ship and contraband forfeited in favor of the government. Yet both Sacramento and Maravillas did nothing. Under a recent agreement with the National Food Authority, Customs officials are supposed to transfer smuggled rice within two days of forfeiture to the nearest NFA warehouse. There’s a big one in Cebu, waiting for such rice that NFA could sell to the poor through rolling stores at only P11 per kilo. The 30,000 sacks of rice never reached the poor.

Two months passed, with five Customs guards assigned to take day and night shifts at the wharf. On Dec. 24, Sacramento went absent. He supposedly was visiting his wife in the US, but Villanueva does not recall approving any official leave. Customs offices in fact were supposed to be open for the holidays, not covered by the week-long vacation granted by President Arroyo. Also on that day the five guards came upon a big amount of cash to get together for sumptuous dining and long drinking. By dusk, four were so drunk that they went home. The fifth, Julius Villarin, was listed for the night shift. Yet he too went home, supposedly to change into fresh clothes. When he returned at 4 o’clock the next morning, the ship and cargo were gone. He contacted his fellow guards. They reported the incident at 6 a.m.

Villanueva recalled both Sacramento and Maravillas to Manila, and assigned the Iloilo-Customs district collector to take over Cebu. He also asked his Intelligence and Enforcement Group to review their actions that led to the escape. Camacho called in the NBI, also to investigate the escape and the events leading up to it. President Arroyo in turn ordered the justice department to determine the criminal culpability of the Customs officials and guards who messed up the case. The state prosecutor assigned to review the NBI and IEG reports recommended that both Sacramento and Maravillas be charged with graft, along with the guards, for sleeping on their jobs.

The mystery goes on. The Cebu Coast Guard unit cannot explain to this day why it let the MV Great Faith leave port without clearance. Navy ships and Air Force planes have combed the Visayan seas but turned up nothing. Customs and NFA officials, too, cannot say if the smuggled rice had found its way into local markets.

Strangest of all is the actuation of a finance undersecretary. In clear disregard of specific orders of Villanueva, Camacho and President Arroyo, this official has cautioned the NBI investigating team leader and the state prosecutor to go slow in filing criminal charges against Sacramento and Maravillas. On several occasions, he told them that they should limit their investigation to the guards, specifically Villarin, and to ignore the earlier questionable actions of the higher-ups.

What the undersecretary doesn’t know is that the state prosecutor has sent a memo to the Office of the President calling for the indictment of the two erstwhile Cebu officers. "Government must show its political will in punishing officials who are abetting smuggling and corruption at the Bureau of Customs," the prosecutor wrote. "This can be demonstrated by charging the two officials, and not merely their subalterns, in view of their clear and explicit role in the disappearance of the ship. The breaches in the performance of their duties were palpable and flagrant. To do otherwise would invite public condemnation that we are only after the small fry, and that we have conducted only a moro-moro investigation."

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The Phil. Petroleum Sea Transport Association sent this rejoinder to my piece, "Shortage of Oil Tankers Looms," on the PNOC Shipping & Transport Corp. (Gotcha, 6 Feb. 2002):

"PSTC is actually what was Luzon Stevedoring Corp., a private firm before it was taken over by the Marcos martial law regime. The need to control strategic industries and firms like Lusteveco was the hallmark of the military government. Since 1986, with the overthrow of the Marcos regime, the mindset of the government to control private firms was no longer ‘in’.

"It is not true that private shippers by 1994 were leasing bottows from abroad. Many in fact invested in second-hand and brand-new vessels. It was PSTC that went into tanker leasing. PSTC still has a live back-to-back charter of two tankers from Japan through one lucky Filipino broker. These tankers are Andres Bonifacio (built 1987) and Felipe Agoncillo (built 1981).

"It is also not true that there were no takers in the two times that PSTC was auctioned. The first auction had only one bidden, hence declared a failure. The second drew five bidders, but PSTC failed to deliver on its commitment to include a five-year contract for its tankers. The bidding was eventually declared a failure.

"It is not true that private shippers have aging tankers and are thus being rejected by oil companies. The private sector registers and average age of 12.6 years, compared to 19 years for PSTC’s fleet of four tankers (two of which it owns, while two are leased).

"PSTC never offered any Philpesta member, or the association for that matter, to buy the firm for P124 million and continue shipping to ‘missionary routes.’ Incidentally, there are no missionary routes in the oil industry.

"(PSTC president) Gen. Cesar Tapia claims that the industry needs ten new vessels to meet shipping demand in the next two years. Assuming each vessel has a capacity of 30 kilo-barrels, the oil industry has to grow by an average of 18.6 percent per annum within the next two years to absorb today’s surplus and the added tonnage. How can the industry grow by 18.6 percent p.a. when the country is in the midst of an economic slowdown, and demand for tankers is declining due to conversion of fuel-oil fired poer plants to natural gas? Peresently there are 17 tankers idle for more than six months now due to low petroleum demand."

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Catch Sapol ni Jarius Bondoc at 8-10 a.m. today on DWIZ 882-AM. Guests: Marissa Camacho-Reyes and Dan Songco of Code-NGO to talk about the controversial PEACe Bonds; and Aleli Pansacola of Dailah Enterprises to talk about soaps, detergents and scents made from herbs planted in Laguna.

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