Chiz to BOC: File
smuggling raps vs. Torres
By Office of Senator Chiz
Escudero
September 22, 2015
PASAY CITY – Sen.
Chiz Escudero said the Bureau of Customs (BOC) should file smuggling
charges against former Land Transportation Office (LTO) chief Virginia
Torres for trying to negotiate the release of P100 million worth of
smuggled Thai sugar.
Escudero said the BOC should
send a strong message that the administration is serious in its bid to
curb smuggling that even perceived administration allies will not be
spared.
“Cases must be filed against
her if indeed there’s evidence to prove that she intervened or is
trying to intervene in an illegal shipment,” Escudero said.
The veteran lawmaker said
the BOC should take the cue from Malacañang’s pronouncement that
influence peddling will not tolerated by the administration.
Presidential Communications
Operations Office (PCOO) Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. on Sunday said
that if there was proof that Torres committed such prohibited act,
then it may be acted upon in accordance with the law.
“If the BOC is fascinated in
looking into the measly ‘padala’ of our overseas Filipino workers (OFWs),
then the more it should be interested in pursuing the people behind
the importation of 64 shipping containers of smuggled sugar worth more
than P100 million,” said Escudero, who has been seeking a law against
influence-peddling since 2007.
Senate Bill No. 118, which
Escudero refiled in 2013, states that “it shall be unlawful for any
person to engage in influence peddling or the act of representing
oneself, either orally or in writing, as being able, whether real or
imagined, to influence, facilitate or assist another person having
some business, transaction, application, request or contract with the
government in which a public official or employee has to intervene.”
Torres reportedly last month
tried to plead for the release of the illegally imported goods, which
were also not covered by import permits by the Sugar Regulatory
Administration (SRA).
The said shipping containers
were the subject of 24 alert orders of the Intelligence Group of the
BOC.
According to Escudero, the
government should train its sights on sugar smuggling rather than
targeting the “balikbayan” boxes being sent by OFWs.
“The BOC should run after
big-time smugglers instead of molesting our OFWs. The agency is being
hard on our OFWs who play a major part in building the economy, but is
being easy on those who are ruining it,” the senator said.