The much-awaited Philippine Bureau of Customs (BOC) revamp has begun, with five individuals endorsed as deputy commissioner by Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima.
The new deputy commissioner for intelligence and enforcement is former Armed Forces of the Philippines chief Jessie Dellosa. Dellosa, who retired in January, will handle a much larger division, resulting from the merger of the positions of resigned deputy commissioner for Intelligence Danny Lim and deputy commissioner for Enforcement Horacio Suansing, Jr.
Lim resigned right after the BOC was chastised by President Aquino in his State of the Nation Address for the agency’s inability to curb smuggling.
Customs and trade expert Atty Agaton Teodoro Uvero has been endorsed to replace Prudencio Reyes, Jr. as deputy for the Assessment and Operations Coordinating Group.
A licensed customs broker, Uvero is widely regarded — at least until recently – as the lawyer of the logistics industry, having counseled the Philippine International Seafreight Forwarders Association, Aircargo Forwarders of the Philippines Inc and the Port Users Confederation.
He was also a consultant for USAID. He wrote a column for PortCalls, Across Borders www.portcalls.com/category/opinion/across-borders/, which dealt with customs and trade issues and was a regular speaker at the annual PortCalls Cargo Economics Conference.
National Tax Research Center (NTRC) executive director Trinidad Rodriguez and Department of Budget and Management director Myrna Chua will respectively replace deputy commissioners Peter Manzano (Revenue Collection and Monitoring Group) and Juan Lorenzo Tañada III (Administration).
Just like the BOC, the NTRC is under the finance department.
Earlier, PortCalls reported the appointment of Primo Aguas, a former IBM executive, to replace Ma. Caridad Manarang as deputy commissioner for Management Information System and Technology Group.
Aguas has been the ASEAN Insurance Sales Leader for IBM based in Kuala Lumpur since July 2010. He has over 30 years of technology, financial industry and management experience primarily in the banking and insurance sector.
He was previously the chief operating officer of the Shared Services Division of Malaysia’s largest local composite insurer, Hong Leong Insurance Bhd. He was also the general manager of the information technology hub of Prudential Services Asia and had worked at Andersen Consulting (Accenture) and AIG SEA Ltd.
