Why reforms at Customs fail

Former Customs commissioner Rozzano “Ruffy” Biazon sent a very interesting rejoinder to my previous day’s column about the former agency he once headed. Actually, he sent me SMS (as in short messaging service) to rectify an item about his stint at the Customs Bureau. Obviously, he still uses the same mobile numbers and he kept mine in his phonebook even after he is no longer the Customs chief.

We exchanged our contact mobile numbers when he was still at the Customs Bureau and paid us a visit at The STAR editorial office sometime in May 2013. He personally visited us after reading also a column I wrote about the “stink” reaching our office in Port Area, Manila from the nearby Customs warehouses where spoiled agricultural products were being unloaded.

In particular, Biazon corrected me when I stated he was the “first” Customs chief appointed by President Benigno “Noy” Aquino III. He texted: “Good am! Read your column today. Just a correction.. I wasn’t the first under PNoy. I was the second. First was Lito Alvarez who served from July 2010-Sept 2011. I was the longest serving from Sept. 2011 to Dec. 2013.”

That settled, it only meant the Aquino administration has had four Customs commissioners during the past five years in office. And the incumbent commissioner Alberto Lina is the fourth for President Aquino’s remaining one year and two months in office. Lina was appointed last April 23.

Lina was appointed to replace erstwhile Customs chief John Sevilla. President Aquino named Lina immediately after accepting Sevilla’s resignation that day.

As I’ve cited in my previous day’s column, Biazon’s exit was attended by strings of controversies in the same way Sevilla’s short stint at the Customs Bureau ended abruptly. Biazon was at the receiving end of severe criticisms from no less than President Aquino in his state of the nation address (SONA) in Congress in 2013.

Fast forward. At the House hearing for the proposed 2016 budget of the Department of Finance (DOF) more than two weeks ago, Valenzuela City Rep. Magtanggol Gunigundo questioned the appointment of eight retired military generals as customs district collectors, most of whom the lawmaker noticed failed to meet their respective collection targets. The Customs Bureau is one of the attached agencies of the DOF headed by Sec. Cesar Purisima.

In a brief exchange of SMS, Biazon also reacted to the concerns echoed by his former colleague in Congress on the appointment of these ex-military generals at Customs. “The appointment of generals was a DOF idea,” Biazon confirmed.

Biazon told me he is currently involved at the congressional district of his father, incumbent Muntinlupa City Rep. Rodolfo Biazon, also a retired Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief of staff during the term of P-Noy’s late mother, former President Corazon Aquino.

Ironically, among the ex-military men now at the Customs Bureau is AFP chief of staff retired Gen. Jesus Dellosa, whom President Aquino appointed as deputy commissioner for Intelligence Group (IG). Dellosa became one of six deputy customs commissioners following his mandatory retirement from the AFP in January 2013.

Incidentally, for the past five years of his administration, President Aquino has had seven AFP chiefs of staff, including Dellosa and incumbent AFP chief Gen.Hernando Iriberri whose mandatory age of retirement falls in April 2016 yet.

It seems unfair for these military and police officers to be retired at prime age of 56 years old or after they complete 30 years in the service. For those who graduated from the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) and the Philippine National Police Academy (PNPA), their four-year training is included in the number of years in government service as fully subsidized students of the state.

On the other hand, the rest of government workers or those in the civil service are required to retire at 65 years old.

I have nothing against these retired military officers serving in the civilian agencies of the government. Once they retire from the police or military establishments, they go back to civilian lives. Their experience and training could still be tapped by related jobs in the civil service like perhaps in Customs. But not as district collectors but maybe consultants if their security expertise and intelligence networks are needed to go after smugglers and other nefarious illegal activities at the bureau.

Although he did not follow his father’s footsteps in the military, Biazon disclosed he is at present a member of the Advisory Council for PNP-NCRPO helping them with their Performance Governance System.

No longer a member of the Aquino administration, the former Muntinlupa City congressman obviously can now speak more freely and openly. Biazon though remains an active member of President Aquino’s Liberal Party (LP). However, it seems his party has ignored him and his father for Senate slate in next year’s election. The elder Biazon will run instead for re-election for his third and last term as congressman.

Biazon ran but lost among the 12-man senatorial candidates of President Aquino’s LP slate during the May 2013 elections. One year after the lapse of the ban on losing candidates from being appointed in government posts, Biazon was named Customs commissioner until he and P-Noy parted ways four months after the 2013 SONA.

“During my time, I had pursued the passage of the Customs modernization bill, seeing it as a necessary measure to initiate long term reforms in the bureau. I even lobbied for it to be certified,” Biazon recalled. “But support from the DOF for the passage of the bill was lackluster and Malacañang did not respond to my calls for certification,” he now says.

“The pre-shipment inspection he (Lina) mentioned... I had proposed that to DOF back in 2012 and submitted a prepared Customs Administrative Order for the approval of DOF in 2013 but it remained pending up to now,” Biazon rued. He was referring to our forum discussions with Lina at the Kapihan sa Manila Bay last week.
Now we know why and where Customs chief fails in any attempts to reform a graft-ridden agency.

* * *

Newly installed Department of the Interior and Local Government Secretary Mel Senen Sarmiento and former Customs chief Ruffy Biazon will be our featured guests in today’s Kapihan sa Manila Bay at Luneta Hotel.