'Please release me'

Most people would like to go through life without problems, but that unfortunately is a very unrealistic aspiration. So we simply try to plod through or deal with it. Some of us try to justify problems as a cause and effect or as “Karma”.

Recently, I went through a problem that any tax payer would have dubbed an injustice, a measure of the state of corruption in government or pure and simple red tape at the expense of ordinary people.

After reflecting on my options and how I should view the annoying inconvenience before me, I sensed that this “problem” had to happen to me because I was the right person at the right place, at the right time to bring focus to the problem.

So today’s lesson is that things don’t randomly happen to us. We either caused it, or it was designed to come our way because we can make a difference.

*   *   *

For over a decade, I have kept tabs on property disposals or biddings that goes on in the different government agencies. In 10 years I have learned a lot about how a “syndicate” actually rigs or orchestrate the bidding.

First of all, you have a gang of people who register as separate bidders. From the first day of viewing to the final day of bidding, they have a constant presence in the office conducting the property disposal.

Such syndicates concentrate on the Bureau of Customs but also operate in various government offices that regularly hold property disposals or auctions of confiscated goods. They are particularly fond of confiscated vehicles, condemned or unserviceable machineries and heavy equipment. Anything they can “fastbreak” for a 10 to 20 percent profit is ideal.

The “syndicate” monitors who are the interested parties and after profiling “outsiders”, they use their inside contacts to find out how interested the newbies or outsiders are and if they have serious capitalization.

If the person is an “outsider” or a newbie, they make contact and offer to either broker or bid for the outsider in a rigged bidding. It’s not the bidding committee that rigs it, but the “syndicate of bidders” who already know what, how much and who will be the highest bidder since all of this has been pre-arranged in some cheap coffee shop amongst themselves.

They even work out deals with potential competitors in order to work out an agreement so that items can be equitably distributed and to avoid the unnecessary expense and a bloody bidding war.

So in the hunt for bidding irregularities, members of bidding committees are often the wrong targets. What some people overlook is the fact that some of the bidders are actually relatives or stand-ins of government employees working within the system. This is another way of how the bidding ends up getting rigged.

What usually happens is that a bidder from the syndicate wins, then they either offer the product at a profit right there on the floor or some “nice” guy from the government office will suggest that the losing bidder can “buy back” the goods.

I have participated in two biddings and it is very interesting how different the two events were. The first bidding under the Cultural Center of the Philippines consisted of a “group tour” of all the goods being disposed.

One week later, all interested parties were invited at 10 a.m. to go to a conference room where all the goods were listed on the board. The bids were collected, opened, listed on the board and it was clear as day as to who won in what category.

What made the first bidding all the more better was that everything was over in an hour and after two hours I already had all the documents as well as the item I won.

In the case of the Bureau of Customs, the bidding was at 1:30 p.m., which gave winners very little time to clear out their goods. We submitted our bid and after a few hours we knew who won and lost the bid.

From there everything turned bad. We did not get immediate release of our documents because the system requires winning bidders to go around in circles to get clearances from offices that did not participate in the bidding process. An existing memo prohibits Customs officials of directly handling documents so even the committee members could not assist winners.

Instead of two hours, it is now almost six days. What happened?

According to a source, some insiders were unhappy that we did not use their services to bid or broker the goods out of Customs. People whose signatures were needed were late or could not be found for two days.

In addition, we also learned that the “Clearance process” required the signatures from the “Intelligence office” and some “security” people all of whom were never involved in the Bid process. By law, this is “Red Tape”.

As a result of this “problem”, I have made the acquaintance of Commissioner Lito Alvarez who I now realize is like a man with a single fly swatter out to eliminate a swarm as large as those in our dumpsites.

Rather than blindly swing at someone who did not cause my discomfort, I have decided to give the Commissioner some ammo to get rid of a handful. Perhaps by making our experiences and suggestions known to those in authority, we can at least help reduce the odds.

If Commissioner Alvarez wants to drive some of the flies away, perhaps he should implement a six-month assignment rotation and transfer of all personnel especially those who have been on the ground too long. The cops do it, the AFP does it, why not Customs?

Biddings and releasing should be done in within the day and the entire business of bidding & releasing should be the sole responsibility of the Bid Committee and no one else. Rather than curse the darkness light several candles because flies don’t like it!