More Money in Cubao than in Northern, Central Luzon

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Majority of the businesses in the Philippines are located in Imperial Metro Manila. Thus the monstrous traffic because people from the provinces jostled and shoved there to get the elusive jobs that haunt the country.

According to Bureau of Internal Revenue Region No. 6 Director Marina de Guzman, a smallest Revenue District Office in BIR Region No. 7, where its main office she once headed is based in Quezon City collected more than the two regional offices of the tax agency in Northern Luzon.

Cubao, Quezon City

“My smallest district there had a goal of a region,” she told this writer.

She referred to the RDO in Cubao, Quezon City that had a goal of P50 billion last year.

BIR Region No. 1, that oversees Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, La Union, and Pangasinan,  had a tax target of P17, 646,987,000.00 last year.

This year it has a tax goal of P19.8 billion according to Revenue District Office – 3 Chief Chum dela Torre.

Region No. 2 based in Tuguegarao, Cagayan had a lower tax goal than BIR Region No. 1.

For this writer, the collection of RDO in Cubao could probably surpass even if we juxtaposed BIR Region No. 3 in Central Luzon with the two BIR Regions I mentioned.

De Guzman cited that Pasig, the biggest RDO of BIR Region 7, had a goal of almost P100 billion last year.

Region 7 and its nine RDOs  were tasked by the government to collect P171 billion last year.

If the P171 billion was added with the 20 percent spike as customarily done by the national office based in Quezon City, it could be P205 billion tax target for year 2019.

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Blame the Filipinos’ selfishness that residents of Urdaneta City and four towns in Pangasinan reap the consequences of their folly after the management of a superhighway paid them a pittance.

Head Revenue Executive Assistant Beverly Milo of the Bureau of Internal Revenue told this writer at her office in Quezon City that scheming owners want the valuation of their land lowered in their tax declaration so they pay less real property tax at their local government unit and capital gain tax  and others at the BIR when they sell their land.

As a consequence, the Private Infra Development Corporation (PIDC), the owner of the Tarlac-Pangasinan-La Union Expressway (TPLEX), bought their lands through expropriation at  P50 per square meter (PSM) despite the improvements they have on those agricultural land cum residential.

“Basihan iyong tax declaration. Kung tax declaration whether may improvement ka doon o hindi siyempre ang logic diyan Filipino you want the value of the property to be lowered”.

Many of them protested that the price given to them by the PIDC - a subsidiary of San Miguel Corporation - was miniscule.

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 Milo, who was the former Revenue District Office-6 based in Urdaneta City, said that a PSM of an agriculture, residential, and commercial lands vary as based on the zonal valuation of the BIR.

“Maximum pinaka reasonable sa agricultural P50 (PSM), commercial ang area iyan ang nakakasama diyan kasi the area can go as high as P1,000. Residential most probably tumatakbo siya P700 to P800”.

Milo cited that the sellers of lands in Urdaneta and the towns of  Laoac, Binalonan, Pozorrubio and Sison were classified into two.

“Ang nangyari kasi diyan sa TPLEX dalawa iyan. Iyong iba they agreed to sell their properties, considered as voluntary based on the zonal valuation of the BIR, while it is voluntary there is no need for you to go to court,” She stressed.

She said the mistakes of those sellers they did not upgrade the classification of their lands.

“They were not able to upgrade the classification of the lot. Even if your residence is located within that area which is considered a part of that farmland, others it was not classified as residential where TPLEX acquisition came in the value of the property existing at that time is considered as agricultural”.

200 of these landowners blocked one lane of the express way for half day in February, creating monstrous traffic along the Pozzurobio exit because until now the management of TPLEX did not pay their “just compensation”.

She said that if they want the value of their land appraised higher they have to prove to the court their evidences.

But tax experts see these as a futile exercise as the tax declaration that identify the property as agricultural will go against them.


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