Iloilo policewoman manhandles TV reporter

An Iloilo policewoman was caught on television Monday afternoon manhandling a GMA female reporter inside a police station.

The video footage showed Andrea Gorriceta slapping GMA reporter Charlene Belvis, 24, inside the Jaro police station.

Belvis suffered scratches and bruises after she was hit several times allegedly by Gorriceta who apparently resented the GMA crew’s getting video footages of her when she hit a certain Ria Aquino while maneuvering her car in front of the MO2 bar and restaurant in Mandurriao district of Iloilo.

Gorriceta claimed that three men stoned her car after she had bumped Ria.

Belvis’ TV crew located Gorriceta’s car along Jalandoni street in Jaro district and immediately alerted the police. The car, however, reportedly sped off in the direction of the Jaro station.

Belvis and her crew followed the car and the policewoman to the police station. They continued taking footages, including the damage to the car.

Gorriceta’s male companion tried to dissuade Belvis’ cameraman from taking video footages but the female reporter argued that they were only doing their job.

Gorriceta reportedly slapped Belvis first when they were about to enter the police station. She started pulling her hair and dragging her. The video footages caught Gorriceta assaulting the hapless female reporter.

Belvis reportedly hit her head on the station’s floor and suffered scratches on her arm and bruises on her head and body because of that attack by Gorriceta.

“It was so sudden and unexpected,” Belvis reportedly told newsmen when interviewed later.

The network intends to file criminal charges against Gorriceta, Gerthrode Tan-Baterina, the TV station’s supervisor, said.

Belvis rejected the idea of a possible settlement with Gorriceta.

P36-M smuggled sugar seized in 2008

Sugar Administrator Rafael Coscolluela reported on Monday that the SRA and Bureau of Customs managed to seize a total of P36 million worth of smuggled sugar, mostly from Thailand, this year.

This amount vastly exceeded the P9.32 million in smuggled sugar intercepted and seized in 2007, Coscolluela said.

Most of the seized sugar was coursed through the Manila International Container Port and the Subic Freeport from January to Dec. 22 this year.

Some of the seized sugar had been bid out and classified as “D” sugar. This means that it is supposed to be shipped out to the world market. How many actually complied with that provision has not been clarified yet

“D” or world sugar is banned from disposal in the domestic market. This aims to preclude downgrading the price of domestic sugar by adding it to the domestic supply.

Coscolluela, however, mentioned the loss of 141 bags of refined sugar from the 1,547 bags seized from the shipment consigned to New Will Chan Trading of No. 27 Mayon st., Quezon City last Nov.s 13.

The smuggled sugar was seized but the trading firm’s Bonny Yu managed to submit only photocopies of documents covering only local rice and imported flour.

“No documents on the subject sugar were ever presented,” Coscolluela stressed.

It was District Collector Horacio Suansing Jr. of the Manila Port who issued a warrant of seizure and detention on the recommendation of Customs Commissioner Napoleon Morales, Coscolluela said. The bags of sugar were in the custody of the Presidential Anti-Smuggling Group.

“For unknown reason and while the said bags of sugar were in the prior custody of the PASG, the subsequent inventory revealed only an actual count of 1,406 bags instead of the previous count of 1,547 bags. A total of 141 bags were found to be missing,” Coscolluela reported.

The “mysterious disappearance” of the 41 bags of smuggled sugar has been placed under investigation by Atty. Jen Diokno of the Law Division of the Customs’ Intelligence and Investigation Service, Suansing reportedly informed Coscolluela.

Notices of hearings will be served, including to the SRA, noted the SRA head.

Coscolluela said more smuggled sugar was intercepted in ports outside Manila and Subic. The accounting will be made soon, he added.

Well, that’s good news for sugarmen. Most of them have been howling about the poor price of domestic raw sugar.

Anyway, the common perception is that the smuggling of sugar has contributed to worsening the sugar price situation.

Well, perhaps, this situation will ease the travails of sugarmen, especially the sugar farmers who have been decrying the increasing cost of production.