Senator Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito on Monday, May 22 pushed for the modernization and automation of the Bureau of Customs (BOC).
Ejercito said he is certain that modernizing the operations of the BOC will address corruption in the agency as “human discretion” in critical operations and assessments would be reduced.
“Hindi makapag-automate at dahil ang computerization nila ay naaantala, ang nangyayari, nabibigyan ng human discretion (They can’t automate, and because
computerization is delayed, what happens is they give human discretion),” Ejercito
said in an interview.
“Pag hindi computerized, pag may human discretion, pag may bura-bura, alam na po natin kung ano nangyayari sa ganoon (If it's not computerized, if there's human discretion, if there's an erasure, we already know what's going on),” he added.
Ejercito, who principally authored the Anti-Agricultural Smuggling Law, said automation will prevent assessment officers from manipulating the value of goods entering the country.
The senator said he has received reports that the assessed value of a given product entering the country would sometimes differ across ports.
“Ang napakapowerful diyan ay yung intelligence and assessment service na iisang tao lang po halos ang naglalagay ng assessed values sa lahat ng produkto (The one who is powerful here is the intelligence and assessment service because only one person is in charge in providing assessed values on all products),” Ejercito said.
“Kaya nakapagtataka, sa Port of Subic, sa Port of Manila, iba-iba yung presyo ng iisang produkto. Nagkakaroon po ng duda doon (That's why it's surprising, in the Port of Subic, in the Port of Manila, the price of the same product is different. That is suspicious),” he pointed out.
The senator said the national government should resume and expedite the BOC’s modernization program to address these discrepancies in the assessment of goods entering the country.
He said even BOC officials admitted during the recent hearing that the delays in their modernization program is one huge dilemma of the agency.