THE offer of resignation as well as the submission of letter of relinquishment of some officials at the Bureau of Customs (BOC) should result to an increase in the collection of revenues needed by the government to fund its public services and development projects.
Otherwise, these mass resignations and relinquishments of posts or assignments are nothing but “moro-moro” intended to appease President Aquino’s obvious dissatisfaction, if not at all wrath, over the bureau’s grossly dismal performance for the past few years.
According to Federation of Philippine Industries Chairman Jesus Arranza, the mere changing of people holding key or sensitive positions in the BOC alone cannot help solve the decades-old problem of smuggling.
Even any creative measures, such as periodic rotation of assignments, employees having no pockets, or table having no drawers, would not help solve the widespread smuggling we have unfortunately learned to have lived up with.
This is so because like corruption, the problem of smuggling is so endemic in the bureau that requires drastic policy and structural reforms for it to become effective and efficient, and thus resolve the shortfall that has become synonymous with its performance.
Appointing new people from within their ranks is like opening up more windows for them to steal from the national’s coffers – like assigning different dogs but with the same collars and nothing can therefore be expected from them.
Many good people I know do not share much optimism with the rest that significant reforms are forthcoming in the BOC unless BOC Commissioner Ruffy Biazon and his other deputies, along with their port collectors, allow the President a free hand to overhaul their unit.
For one, as Arranza has pointed out, there are many provisions in the Tariff and Customs Code of the Philippines that have not been
implemented to the letter.
What is needed to reform BOC is for the President to create an independent apolitical body that would study an overhaul of the entire BOC bureaucracy and recommend policy and structural reforms, including an abolition or replacement of the bureau.
Some have proposed the privatization of the BOC, while others are looking at a model that paved the way for the reformation of the Central Bank of the Philippines to become what is now known as the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.
In fairness to Commissioner Biazon, he has introduced some reform measures starting with the purging of the list of accredited media practitioners covering the bureau. But that in itself is too way below the public’s expectations.
Biazon and his minions should do more than that if they want to keep themselves in office.
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