DA panel to probe pork-import ‘tongpats’
THE Department of Agriculture (DA) has formed a special committee to kick-start the investigation on the alleged “tongpats” (kickback) system in the country’s pork importation as claimed by a senator.
A day after pronouncing that the DA will investigate the claims of Sen. Panfilo Lacson, Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar formed a special committee led by the department’s legal service chief to look into alleged corruption in its meat importation system.
“While we stand firm that the issuance of MAV [minimum access volume] in-quota allocation is above-board and non-discretionary, we have created a special committee to look into allegations made by a lawmaker that there is a syndicate in the DA engaged in a payoff scheme,” Dar said in a statement on Wednesday.
The DA said the investigation of the committee will take off from the initial findings by the DA-MAV Secretariat. Dar directed the committee to submit their final findings and recommendations to him by the end of the month.
In the same statement, the DA-MAV Secretariat pointed out that “the allegation of corruption to get a MAV import certificate is remote” since the existing licensees “are the same ones every year, and who were previously accredited by the past DA administrations.”
In its initial report to Dar, the DA-MAV Secretariat noted that, “there are no disparities between the allocations of the current MAV
licensees and those given prior to the current DA administration.”
The DA chief said, “We would like to emphasize that our objective in increasing the MAV and reducing tariff is to stabilize supply and price of pork.”
The DA said that its MAV Secretariat imposes penalties on licensees who were not able to use 70 percent of their allocation for the year. The unused volume is recalled and deducted from the licensee and will be raffled off to qualified applicants, it added.
The Businessmirror reported on Wednesday that the DA will look into the allegations made by Lacson during Monday’s Senate plenary session regarding the alleged P5 to P7 per kilogram of imported pork kickback scheme.
(Related story: https://businessmirror.com. ph/2021/03/17/dar-kickback-claim-on-porkto-be-probed/)
Lacson bared the allegation just before senators adopted a resolution, expressing the sense of the Senate, asking President Duterte to reject a twin proposal—both endorsed by the Da—to slash tariffs on imported pork while increasing the MAV for imports.
There had been concern that these moves, instead of curbing inflation from price spikes and supply shortfalls caused by African Swine Fever (ASF), would simply kill the local hog industry, deprive the government of revenue, and fatten vested interests.
Hog raisers asked Duterte on Tuesday to reject the cut-tariffshike-mav proposals.
(Related story: https://businessmirror.com. ph/2021/03/17/local-hog-raisers-writeduterte/)
Meat Importers and Traders Association (Mita) President Jesus C. Cham earlier said the country’s MAV system is an “established, robust system” that is “very transparent and equitable.”
“The reason I say that [is] because this was established in 1996 and survived for 21 years without controversies,” Cham told the Businessmirror.
Cham, who sits in the MAV Council and whose company has a MAV allocation, said he is not aware of any “tongpats” system in the current MAV setup.
DAVAO City—advocates to extend the transition period of the Bangsamoro government are set to file today, Thursday, March 18, 2021, at Malacañan Palace a petition signed by more than 1 million signatories, optimistic that President Duterte would accede to their request for an extension.
Organizers of the online petition signing said they rushed the printing of the petition to submit it to the Office of the President coinciding with the 53rd anniversary of the infamous Jabidah Massacre in Corregidor Island.
As of 11:20 a.m. on Wednesday, the signatories reached 1,110,383, with even non-muslims, such as Orlando Cardinal Quevedo of the Archdiocese of Cotabato City and Sen. Risa Hontiveros, affixing their signatures. Even in the lone province of Sulu, where the governor and his congressman-son expressed their opposition, was the first to ever sign the petition came from Indanan,
Sulu. Other signatories include members of non-moro tribes in Maguindanao and residents coming from as far as Northern Luzon.
Prof. Agdulhadi Daguit, president of the Federation of Bangsamoro Coordinating Councils of the Philippines, said a delegation of Bangsamoro officers and key leaders of civilsociety organizations and peace advocate groups in Mindanao, would submit the petition in Malacañang, which granted them the 2:00 p.m. schedule. Daguit teaches at the University of the Philippines Institute of Islamic Studies.
He said a group of about 100 would conduct a brief program at the Palace grounds to demonstrate the “Bangsamoro’s wholehearted trust in the President to hearken to our call to certify as urgent the bills in the House of Representatives and the Senate.”
Lawyer Mary Ann Arnado, secretary-general of the Mindanao People’s Caucus, who is also among the organizers of the petition signing, said they timed the submission of the petition with the infamous Jabidah Massacre “to remind us all that 53 years ago, in 1968, the Moro youths have awakened to the call for peace in Mindanao, and now, the same Bangsamoro homeland is still struggling to have that lasting peace.”
Hashim D. Manticayan, president of the League of Bangsamoro Organizations, said the “overflowing” support to the petition indicated three things: “the faith of the majority of the Bangsamoro people to the changes made by the Bangsamoro Transition Authority [BTA] and the Bangsamoro government, the complete trust of the Bangsamoro on the leadership of President Duterte that he would listen to their plight and that this is for the lasting peace in Mindanao.”
“If not for the weak Internet signal in many areas, we could have easily get more than 2 million signatures, more than a majority of the Bangsamoro population,” he said. The five provinces, including the recently annexed Cotabato City and the 26 barangays of North Cotabato, have an estimated population of 4.3 million.
Organizers have said that the BTA, which functions as the interim legislature of the Bangsamoro Autonomous
Region in Muslim Mindanao, recently passed in February this year the Bangsamoro Civil Service Code, and was yet to pass other priority codes during the transition period slated to end next year. These are the Bangsamoro Education Code, Bangsamoro Electoral Code, Local Government Code and Revenue Code.
The BTA though disclosed that some priority codes on local government and education were already referred to their respective parliament committees, and the electoral and revenue codes are being finalized by the Cabinet.
The BTA was granted a three-year transition to end in 2022, which the current Bangsamoro government has told the national government was insufficient to finish the commitments by both parties, the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front to the peace agreement. Under the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro, which was the final peace agreement, the former Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao would be reconstituted to form the larger Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.