MANILA, Philippines – Is the reform arm of the Department of Finance (DOF) ineffective and inefficient? Or is there politics involved?

The House Committee on Ways and Means on Tuesday, January 26, uncovered the inefficiency of the DOF’s reform arm, the Office of the Revenue Agency Modernization (ORAM), in its inquiry on the removal of 7 former generals tasked to improve revenue collections. 

The 7 served as project managers and were assigned as port collectors expected to help increase collections of the Bureau of Customs (BOC). The BOC is under the supervision of the DOF.

The 7 former generals were: Mario Mendoza (Manila), Ernesto Benitez (Batangas), Esteban Castro (Clark), Elimir dela Cruz (Manila International Container Port), Bonifacio de Castro (San Fernando), Jerry Loresco (Zamboanga), and Arnulfo Marcos (Cebu).

Created in October 2013, ORAM was tasked to improve the performance of the revenue agencies, the BOC and the Bureau of Internal Revenue, both under the DOF. (READ: Customs misses 2015 revenue target)

But BOC Deputy Commissioner Arturo Lachica told the House committee that the 2014 collections of the Port of Manila and the Manila International Container Port (MICP), which both account for almost 60% of the BOC’s collections, failed to meet their targets. Manila missed its targets by 20%, while MICP fell short by 15.3%. The Port of Batangas also missed its target by 18.4%. 

Finance Assistant Secretary Danielle Rieza said, however, that the assessment of the ORAM’s performance should not be based on this failure to meet targets alone, but should also take into consideration “year-on-year growth” achieved by the ports.

Rieza said there was “considerable growth from 2013 to 2014 on individual ports.”

For his part, Customs Commissioner Alberto Lina admitted to House committee chair Romero Quimbo that the ORAM has not been an effective experiment of the DOF. 

Quimbo said, “Importante ang pangangalap ng pondo at base sa datos na galing sa inyo ay hindi sila nakakakakalap ng pondo.” (Collecting funds is very important. And based on the data from [your office], they have not been able to collect funds.) 

‘Demoralizing BOC’

Customs Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence Group Jessie Dellosa told the committee he suspected politics was behind the removal of the 7 ex-generals.

“‘Yung pagtanggal sa kanila sa budget, ‘yun din ang suspicion ko na [may] mga congressman na nagpatanggal sa kanila sa budget,” Dellosa said. (My suspicion was, they were taken out by lawmakers by removing them from the budget.) 

Pressed to identify who these lawmakers were, Dellosa, also former Armed Forces chief of staff, refused to name names.

During the same hearing, Cagayan de Oro Representative Rufus Rodriguez told DOF officials that hiring Customs outsiders instead of tapping career officials can be demoralizing.

“[In] BOC, there are career people there, we should not try to get outsiders. The removal of retired officers [will] give chance to new leaders inside the BOC,” Rodriguez said. 

Quimbo, for his part, said, “[The point is,] the system of BOC has not changed substantially.” He added that there is something inherently wrong when outsiders are given plantilla positions to institute reforms.

‘Chess game played’ 

BIR Commissioner Kim Henares, meanwhile, said the reason the military men were brought in was to bring in “fresh perspectives” to the agency. (READ: Senate approves customs modernization act) 

As head of the DOF’s Internal Revenue cluster, Henares recommended tapping ex-military officials to improve collections and curb corruption at the BOC. 

The retired generals were supposed to institute some changes and then leave “when things had settled down.” 

Asked about politics being a factor in the removal of the generals, Henares likened what happened to a chess game that involved first, removing the generals, and then second, putting “certain people” as replacements.

“I don’t know who are playing the chess game. I don’t know whether it was politicians. I have no idea, but I believe that was the end game, and [the] second part of the end game [putting in replacements] was not successful.” What was approved, she said, was that the second in rank would act as officers-in-charge.

Earlier reports said the BOC officials were sacked to give way to supporters of administration candidates inside the agency to raise funds for campaigning. – Rappler.com