Bureau of Customs confiscated container vans carrying smuggled rice from China worth millions of pesos.
Twelve container vans containing smuggled rice from China worth P20 million was seized by the Bureau of Customs (BOC) on Tuesday.
This was following the the operation at the South Harbor, port of Manila on Tuesday, where the vans were discovered to contain imported rice from China. Earlier, the BOC said the forty-footer container vans were initially suspected to be carrying smuggled rice from Vietnam.
Customs Commissioner Nicanor Faeldon said personnel alerted the BOC Command Center on Oct. 4 following suspicious images captured by CCTV cameras they have seen.
“Nung nalaman nilang (smugglers) si-nieze namin at inalert namin, inabandon agad [ang shipment],” Faeldon said.
Based on the records, the shipment arrived at the Manila port on Aug. 20, and was declared as leatherette. However, when the inspection was done by authorities, it was revealed that the van contained thousand of sacks of rice.
According to the BOC, the shipment was consigned to RPR International Trading in Sta. Cruz, Manila.
Faeldon immediately ordered the suspension of the accreditation of the consignee as an importer.
The BOC commissioner claimed that this is the first time an importer attempted to smuggle rice with this big value into the country using the Port of Manila.
Following this accomplishment, he assured the public that these smugglers will be sanctioned and can no longer sneak goods into the country.
The commissioner said he is considering donating the confiscated rice to government agencies assigned to hand out relief goods to victims of Typhoons Karen and Lawin, like the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) which is in-charge of bringing the assistance to the survivors.
Last week, supertyphoon Lawin slammed parts of Northern Luzon where thousands of families and individuals were forced to evacuate due to the expected damage to be brought by the weather disturbance.