When former investment banker Customs Commissioner John Philip Sevilla resigned on Wednesday, April 22, his boss, Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima extolled his subaltern to high heavens.
“In a span of a year and half, he has shown us that what was then impossible is now possible. It is possible to hope that we can transform institutions, with uncompromising courage and integrity, Purisima enthused.
The finance chief added, waxing rhetorically, about Sevilla:
“As head of the Customs Reform Team, he has helped grow the Bureau’s collections by 21% year on year in 2014 versus 5% in the pre-reform period, transformed Customs to be one of the most radically open and transparent agencies in government, has made government regulation more efficient for doing business in the country, and has taken great strides to thwart graft, technical and outright smuggling by filing cases, alert orders and seizures against erring importers, brokers, and officials. The Bureau of Customs is the most improved national government agency in terms of revenue collection last year, thanks in no small part to the person who led it.”
Sevilla, Purisima pointed out in his press statement, “has served the public well in his lengthy career in government. Even with his stellar record of six years as undersecretary under two secretaries of Finance in his belt, I think unleashing transformative reform in the Bureau of Customs will remain to be one of the pinnacles of his legacy in government.”
After praising the Princeton and Cornell-educated technocrat, Purisima delivered the coup de grâce. Sevilla was being ousted, or fired. Purisima said: “There is always a time when one has to rest and take leave: today is one such day for a fine public servant who has waged the good fight against corruption well.”
If Purisima expected Sevilla to take such a elegant touch of irony sitting down, he didn’t know the latter well.
The following day, Thursday, April 23, Purisima was stung. Sevilla held a press conference. He said, in effect, he was fired by President B.S. Aquino III. The cause of his ouster was political pressure from the powerful Iglesia ni Cristo sect.
The sect reportedly wanted their protégé, a certain lawyer Teddy Sandy S. Raval, to be promoted to head the Bureau of Customs’ enforcement and security services (ESS), from his current post of acting chief of the BOC’s intellectual property office. Raval had four powerful backers – Purisima himself, Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa; Carlo Carag, a Finance undersecretary of Purisima’s; and Teofilo Pilando Jr., a deputy executive secretary.
Sevilla told CNN Philippines the four officials were among those pushing for the appointment of Raval. With 400 people, ESS is virtually the customs bureau itself because it is the customs police. It can open any container, board any ship, conduct raids, and guard the Customs compound 24/7– all in the name of enforcement and security.
“I do not think anyone outside of Customs or outside of government should have any say in appointments in Customs,” Sevilla had insisted. The idea bugged his conscience. “Political appointment felt wrong,” he said. “I don’t compromise on morality.”
In fairness to INC, Sevilla is the first to stress that the religious group did not directly call or contact him to push Raval’s promotion as chief of security and enforcement.
Sevilla has impeccable Ivy League credentials – bachelor of arts, cum laude, government and economics, Cornell 1989; master of public affairs, June 1993, Princeton. He was associate director, sovereign ratings, Standard & Poor’s, July 1993-October 1996; assistant director, credit research, Peregrine Fixed Income Ltd., Hongkong and Jakarta, October 1996-January 1998; VP, fixed income credit research, Salomon Smith Barney Hongkong, January 1998-April 2000; executive director, Asian Special Situations Group, Goldman Sachs (Asia) LLC, Hongkong, May 2000-March 2004.
Sevilla did a splendid job. By June this year, Customs would have been paperless and totally transparent. It would take only four hours to process papers—in some 5,000 daily transactions. With the massive red tape, most of the time, nobody knew what was going on. Hence, graft was easy and the standard practice. Many clerks had open drawers.
Smirked Inquirer columnist Solita Monsod: “He (Sevilla) was not a kaibigan, a kamaganak, a kabarilan, a kaklase. What he was—what he is—is a professional with impeccable credentials. That, unfortunately, is not enough.”
A key Aquino ally, Sen. Sergio Osmeña said it is easy for those who are in power to use Customs as source of funds because it is one of the most corrupt government agencies in the country. Some P200 billion is lost to smuggling. Customs collects P400 billion annually.
“There is a lot of money raised there [BOC] that instead of going to government coffers it goes to private pockets,” the senator told dzBB.
Osmeña regrets that Malacañang did not even stop Sevilla from leaving. “It is Malacañang that should be blamed since it is the one who gave in (to the INC pressure),” the senator added.
The INC is believed to have contributed immensely to Aquino’s come-from-behind victory in the 2010 presidential elections. Former President Joseph Estrada, the second placer in that election, believes INC made the difference for the winner.
Before 2010, INC had always supported Estrada’s candidacy – for mayor, senator, vice president, and president. The INC’s 35,000-strong swing vote in the 2013 Manila mayoralty election gave the victory to Estrada.
In 2010, Aquino garnered almost 15 million votes, five million more than Estrada’s 10 million. Estrada says INC has about three million votes. Had that been added to Estrada’s 10 million, he would have garnered 13 million votes and Aquino’s would have finished with just 12 million votes (15 minus three). The actor former president would have beaten Aquino by a million votes (13 minus 12).
For 2016, the presumptive Liberal Party standard bearer, Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas is trailing behind the frontrunner, Vice President Jejomar Binay, badly.
Roxas needs ample resources (such as funds raised in places like Customs) and the backing of solid voting blocs like the Iglesia.
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