Biazon submits BOC reshuffle proposal to Purisima

MANILA, Philippines - Customs Commissioner Rufino Biazon on Wednesday said he has submitted to Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima the proposed new assignments of the bureau’s district collectors.

Biazon said it is up to the finance chief to evaluate his recommendations, as he asked the public not to pressure the BOC leadership to implement changes in haste.

“Give us time to carefully assess all of these. I would appreciate it if we are given time to make the right decisions and not just be pressured by public opinion,” Biazon said.

In another interview yesterday, Biazon said the reshuffle might have to wait since he has not received feedback from Purisima.

The BOC is one of the attached agencies of the Department of Finance (DOF).

Last Aug. 2, Biazon asked that he be given two weeks to implement the reshuffle of the 17 district collectors.

Today would mark the end of the two-week deadline.

“That was just a self-imposed timeline. We are flexible enough to wait for the results of the DOF on the evaluation of our district collectors,” Biazon said, adding that he intends to make the new assignments effective on Sept. 1.

Some collectors retained

Biazon said not all collectors would be removed from their current positions.

“There would be those who would be retained because of certain initiatives that we are currently undertaking. I do not want to derail our initiatives in certain ports,” he said.

Even the so-called “three kings” were not spared, as Biazon said he recommended that the district collectors assigned in the top three ports would be given other assignments.

“Part of our reassignments are the major ports, (the three kings) are included,” said Biazon.

Dubbed as the “three kings” are Port of Manila (POM) district collector Rogel Gatchalian, Manila International Container Port (MICP) district collector Ricardo Belmonte, and Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) district collector Carlos So.

They were branded as such because of the sensitive ports they supervise and their alleged connections.

But Belmonte earlier said that if the collector is like a king in his district port, then there should be 17 kings since the BOC has 17 port districts.

Collector Belmonte, who is set to retire next year, is the younger brother of Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr.

But the former had said that his brother had no hand in his appointment to the BOC since he was already connected with the bureau even before the Speaker joined politics.

Earlier, Biazon had said that performance in revenue collection would be among the bases in making his recommendations for reassignments.

For the month of July alone, the BOC was supposed to collect P29.637 billion but it only managed to take in P27.951 billion or a shortfall of P1.686 billion.

Eight collectors surpassed their target collections for July.

Concurrent OIC

Meanwhile, in the event that the position of BOC deputy commissioner for Intelligence Group (IG) would be made vacant, Biazon said he would propose to assume the responsibility until such time that an appointment has been made.

It was reported last week that President Aquino accepted the resignation of BOC deputy commissioner for IG Danilo Lim, but the BOC has to receive a formal letter from Malacañang to make Lim’s resignation from the agency official.

“We do not want to have a leadership vacuum in the IG so until such time that a new deputy commissioner for IG has been appointed. I propose I would take over as concurrent officer-in-charge of the IG,” Biazon said.