THE Bureau of Customs (BOC) through its Legal Service filed before the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Thursday, July 19, 2018, smuggling cases against three consignees for misdeclaration and smuggling of goods at the Mindanao Container Terminal in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental.
”These seized shipments were part of the ‘swing operations’ and ‘release now,file later’ schemes which are all illegal and strictly prohibited," BOC commissioner Isidro Lapeña said in a statement.
Charges were filed against Mave Trading, JDan Trading, and General Success Merchandise for violating Republic Act 10845 or the Anti- Agricultural Smuggling Act, Section 1400(Misdeclaration, Misclassification, Undervalutaion in Good Declaration), and Republic Act 4653 or “An Act to Safeguard the Health of the People and maintain the Dignity of the Nation by declaring it a National Policy to Prohibit the Commercial Importation of Textile articles commonly known as Clothing and Rags”.
Mavi Trading involves five containers of onions and two containers of used clothing amounting to P1.6 million with aggregate duties and taxes of P809,579.
While JDan’s shipment involves two container vans of 2,167 bags of sugar declared as pre-fabricated steel. The bags of sugar are worth at around P4.89 million with duties and taxes amounting to P4.15 million.
For General Success Merchandise’ shipments of 2,316 bags of sugar were misdeclared as boiler casings. The bag sugars had an estimated amount of P4.498 million with duties worth more than P3.82 million.
BOC said in a statement that a licensed customs broker identified as Raul M. De Leon Jr. assisted in the processing of the illegal shipments and was charged for the violation.
Meanwhile, Lapeña had already ordered the suspension of BOC employees who participated in the said scheme.
“I have ordered the relief of 11 BOC employees from their positions, and another five BOC employees were administratively charged and preventively suspended,” Lapeña added.