On his Twitter account, Biazon announced that he had offered to resign as Customs head within minutes after the President ended his fourth State-of-the-Nation-Address (SONA).
"In light of the president's statement regarding [Customs], I immediately offered my resignation within minutes after the end of the speech," Biazon said.
But in a subsequent Tweet, the Customs chief quoted the President as saying, ""RUFFY we both know the difficulties in the agency you are trying to reform. My confidence in you remains the same."
In his SONA, the President criticized Customs "whose personnel are trying to outdo each other's incompetence."
"Instead of collecting the proper taxes and preventing contraband from entering the country, they are heedlessly permitting the smuggling of goods, and even drugs, arms, and other items of a similar nature into our territory," the President said, citing Department of Finance's estimate of P200 billion in foregone revenues because of smuggling.
"Where do these people get the gall? One can almost hear these public officials say, 'I don’t care if the weapons go to criminal elements; I don’t care how many lives are ruined by drugs; I don’t care if our fields remain barren forever; What matters is that I am rich; it’s every man for himself.' Such practices have no place in government. If you cannot do your job, you do not deserve to remain in office," the President said.
Customs was one of three agencies singled out for corruption, the other two being the Bureau of Immigration (BI) and the National Irrigation Administration (NI).
"If you are a good, conscientious employee of the BI, NIA, Customs, or any other government agency, I hope that you do even more. It is not enough to lie low and hide inside your cubicle; to prevent wrongdoing is part of your duty. You are in the right, so there is no need to hide; please make it easy for me to find people like you; I will raise you up as praiseworthy examples, that we may fully transform the flawed culture of your agencies," the President said.
source: interaksyon.com
