Solon wants BIR chief fired for incompetence

President Arroyo was urged yesterday to fire her chief taxman, Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) Commissioner Rene Banez, for allegedly being "incompetent" and a "certified NPA (non-performing asset)."

In making the appeal, Rep. Aniceto Saludo (Lakas, Southern Leyte) said Banez and his tax collectors were P27 billion short of their collection target for the first half of this year.

Because they "failed miserably," the government is now facing a huge budget deficit which, as of last May, stood at P107 billion, he said.

At Malacañang, Mrs. Arroyo is set to sign next month the executive order that would create the crack team that would ferret out graft and corruption from the BIR and Bureau of Customs (BoC), both attached agencies of the Department of Finance (DoF).

The ambitious campaign is a brainchild of Finance Secretary Jose Isidro Camacho and intends to plug huge revenue leaks in the government’s most notoriously corrupt agencies.

Saludo said the BIR chief has failed not only the President but also the Filipino people with his "mediocre performance."