{"id":3988,"date":"2015-10-04T17:47:59","date_gmt":"2015-10-04T17:47:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/?p=3988"},"modified":"2015-10-04T17:47:59","modified_gmt":"2015-10-04T17:47:59","slug":"filipino-migrants-in-hk-storm-ph-consulate-over-freight-box-taxation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/?p=3988","title":{"rendered":"Filipino migrants in HK storm PH consulate over freight box taxation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Following the successful \u201cZero Remittance Day\u201d to protest a government directive to randomly open and tax Filipino migrants’ \u201cBalikbayan\u201d boxes, hundreds of Filipino migrants braved the rain and trooped to the Philippine Consulate General today to call for the complete abandonment of said plan.<\/strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n

Led by MIGRANTE Partylist \u2014 Hong Kong and the NO FEE Coalition, outraged Filipino migrant workers lambasted the Philippines’ Bureau of Customs (BoC) and its head, Alberto Lina, for allowing the desecration of Balikbayan boxes and squeezing OFWs to generate campaign funds for administration candidates for next year’s elections. <\/strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThis preposterous proposal by Lina and the BoC really emanates from Malaca\u00f1ang, which is now doing damage-control and is pretending to backtrack due to public pressure but essentially maintaining its stance on generating funds from OFWs. We will not be fooled into complacency by this trickery,\u201d said Vicky Casia-Cabantac of Migrante Partylist \u2013 HK.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Cabantac said that while they believe that partially stopping the random opening of Balikbayan boxes is a gain for Filipino migrants, the threat of taxation stemming from the BoC\u2019s target of P600 million from boxes from overseas Filipinos is still very much present.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u201cWe shall be cash cows no more for the Aquino government that is now scrambling to raise money to prop up candidates of the President\u2019s party for the polls next year. Increasing the fees for freight forwarders will surely mean passing the buck to us who labor hard just so we can send some goods to our loved ones,\u201d explained Cabantac.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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According to the group, such taxation adds on to the numerous added fees that Filipino migrants have been clamoring the government to reduce or to scrap such as the Overseas Employment Certificate or OEC and the passport fee that is much higher overseas than in the Philippines.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u201cEver since, the Aquino government has treated Filipino migrants with contempt, neglect and only dollar sign in his eyes. Despite his partial backtracking on the random opening of Balikbayan boxes, the rampant corruption in the government means our boxes and our earnings are still not safe from greedy hands,\u201d Cabantac remarked. <\/strong><\/p>\n

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The rallyists also called for the resignation of Lina as BoC Commissioner, saying that Lina was placed in the position despite conflict of interest issues. Lina is founder and chairman of 19 companies under the Lina Group of Companies, and was reported to have cancelled the contract of another company in favor of his own.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Protesters handed in a letter signed by almost 100 organizations in Hong Kong that included among their demands \u2013 aside from Lina\u2019s resignation \u2014 full abandonment of the inspection and taxation plan on Balikbayan boxes, compensation for those whose boxes have been illegally searched and violated in the past, apology from Commissioner Lina for unjust depiction of Filipino migrants as smugglers, full report and accounting of the alleged illegal goods confiscated by the BoC, effective actions against big-time smugglers and syndicates working in cahoots with unscrupulous elements in the Bureau, and increasing the budget for services to overseas Filipinos.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Following the successful \u201cZero Remittance Day\u201d to protest a government directive to randomly open and tax Filipino migrants’ \u201cBalikbayan\u201d boxes, hundreds of Filipino migrants braved the rain and trooped to the Philippine Consulate General today to call for the complete abandonment of said plan. Led by MIGRANTE Partylist \u2014 Hong Kong and the NO FEE […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,49],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3988"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3988\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.philippinesentinel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}