Former Customs Commissioner Alberto D. Lina is facing graft charges before the Office of the Ombudsman on the complaint of a businessman who accused Lina of causing injury to a private company.
In his complaint, Mannage Resources Trading Corp. president Lawrence Daniel Sy also named Run After the Smugglers program (RATS) executive director Erwin Mendoza, Revenue Collection Monitoring Group (RCMG) deputy commissioner Arturo M. Lachica, Ruling and Research Division-Legal Service chief Reynaldo N. Yacat, and Ruling and Research Division legal officer Francis T. Tolibas as respondents to the case.
Based on the complainant, the BOC officials, together with private respondents Roberto Cola, Jesus Arranza, and William Ranaga who were identified as officials and members of the Philippine Iron and Steel Institute, unlawfully imposed additional requirements on his shipment last April thereby delaying its release by almost two months.
Sy said his firm’s shipment of 4,929.383 metric tons of deformed steel bars through M/W Well Faith arrived at the Port of Subic on April 23, 2016 but was held because of an Alert Order from the Intelligence Group of the BOC.
He claimed that the alert order was prompted by letters from PISI president Roberto Cola sent to the BOC, the Department of Trade and Industry and the Bureau of Product Standards alleging that the steel shipment was illegal for being substandard and having improper documentation.
But Sy said the DTI-Zambales provincial director Leonila T. Baluyut issued a provisional Import Commodities Clearance certificate on the shipment dated April 18, 2016 while the BPS issued a final ICC on May 19, 2016.
Despite clearance and a test result number conducted by the Metals Industry Research and Development Center), “MRTC was refused and denied the final assessment by the Bureau of Customs at the Port of Subic which prevented payment of taxes for the formal entry of the shipment” supposedly because the alert order is still in effect.
Sy said he was under contract with Topway Builder Inc. to supply and deliver the 4,929.383 MT of steel bars for the agreed price of P154,582,200 but because of the delay the buyer eventually backed out of the deal and transacted with another supplier.
“In sum, the action of Com. Lina, in conspiracy with Attys. Mendoza, Lachica, Tolibas, and Yacat and private respondents Cola, Arranza, and Ranaga, gave unwarranted benefits to other companies in the same line of business specifically those under PISI,” the complainant said.