Ilocos guv felt taxman’s woes

Ilocos Norte Governor Imee Marcos

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

ALAMINOS CITY- The top honcho of the Bureau of Internal Revenue who supervises Western Pangasinan referred to the “Belt-Tightening” Policy of the Aquino Administration in the first fiscal semester for a sluggish tax collection.

Revenue District-5 Chief Quirino Ramos said that in all of the six (6) Revenue District Offices in Region 1, only La Union’s Revenue District Office (RDO) breached the goal  for this year that was given to it by the national government.

“There are no new industries in my district. One of the bulks of my tax sources come from the TRA (Tax Remittance Advisory) where revenues come from the withholding taxes like income and value added tax of contractors doing government projects,” he stressed.

He said that last year all the RDOs in the Ilocos Region were beneficiaries of the massive government spending under the administration of then president Gloria Arroyo. He said the bullish collection during that year was capped by the 2010 national and local election where politicians spent billions of pesos in poll campaign spending.

Ramos blamed the shortfall of his tax goal to the uncollected P75 million TRA.

“I was given a 16% increase tax target .Without the deficit of P75 million I should have hit my target”.

He said that of all the RDOs in Region 1, his district is the smallest.

Ilocos Norte Governor Imee R. Marcos corroborated the woes on the sluggish tax collection encountered by Ramos and most of the RDOs in the Ilocos Region.

Marcos in her column in a tabloid said that the government should not crow on the billions of pesos it save for the first fiscal semester as it did not spend a dime for this year.

“Hindi naman kailangan pa ng isang ekonomista para hindi maunawaan ang ginagawa ng gobyerno. Simple lang naman talaga ito, hindi ba? Ang kailangan ay gumastos, itaya ang pera o i-invest ito ng higit na kumita hindli lang ang kaban ng bayan kundi mismo ang bawat bulsa ng mamayang Pilipino”.

The governor concluded that as result of this policy there was no production that caused unemployment among the taxpayers.