THE Business Permit and Licensing Office (BPLO) of Mandaue City has issued a cease-and-desist order against a warehouse in Barangay Looc, where an estimated P100 million worth of foreign-branded excisable cigarettes were seized on Saturday morning, Oct. 7, 2024.
Investigation revealed that the warehouse lacked the required business permit and regulatory clearances.
Police Captain Nigel Sanoy, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) in Mandaue City Field Unit, said the Business Permit and Licensing Office (BPLO) has already conducted an inspection to identify who is listed as the lessee of the warehouse owned by FMC Warehouse.
Sanoy explained that once the lessee of the said warehouse is identified, they will be the one charged by the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) for violating Section 263 of the National Revenue Code of 1987.
BPLO head Lizer Malate, told reporters on Tuesday, Oct. 8, that the various types of cigarettes, raw materials for production, and machinery worth millions of pesos were discovered inside the warehouse during the inspection.
Malate said the facility appeared to be involved in large-scale operations, although the exact nature and scope of its activities remain under investigation.
The BPLO has said the warehouse was part of a larger network of unregistered facilities operating in Mandaue.
“Currently, there are around 100 warehouses in the City that we will closely monitor to ensure they are operating legally and have proper business permits,” Malate said.
Malate also added that BPLO is investigating the origins of the products stored in the warehouse.
“We are looking into the background of the warehouse, its operations, and where the goods are coming from since the cigarettes bear Chinese markings,” he said.
However, the exact start date of the warehouse’s operations remains unclear.
He added that warehousing operations in the city can often be complex, as some facilities are registered under broad categories like logistics, forwarding, or storage, without fully disclosing their actual activities.
“We have to allow the lessor to explain their side. We still don’t know who owns the warehouse,” Malate said.
‘Contrabands’
Among the contrabands confiscated from the warehouse are packaging machines, boxes of tipping paper, 25 boxes of clear overwraps for packing, 40 boxes of cigarette papers, 50 reams of Baisha cigarettes, 158 reams of Yuxi cigarettes, and 260 reams of Furungwang cigarettes.
Sanoy said Cebu is a strategic location for the illegal company since it is situated in the middle of the country, and the warehouse is easily accessible, being close to the port for smuggling operations.
Joint raid
Sanoy said the cigarette factory had been under surveillance for nearly 10 months, and they were able to trace it after tracking the movement of raw materials and machinery to the warehouse near Ouano Wharf.
Sanoy said they immediately coordinated with the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and launched “Oplan Mega Shopper,” successfully seizing the illicit cigarettes.
The CIDG is also monitoring several other operations smuggling illegal cigarettes in Central Visayas, with some of these products imported from Indonesia through backdoor channels, bypassing the Bureau of Customs. / CAV, AYB, CDF