BIR chief shrugs off abolition threat by incoming President Duterte

File Photo: Commissioner Kim Henares

Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) Commissioner Kim Henares on Tuesday shrugged off incoming President Rodrigo Duterte’s impression that the BIR should be abolished due to corruption.

Henares told DZRH News via ACS Balita anchored by Angelo Palmones and Henry Uri that the BIR posted a significant tax collection during the first quarter of the year.

Henares said excise tax collections on cigarettes which showed that for the month of March, 2016, taxes were paid on 148.6 million packs of cigarettes, compared to 200.3 million packs for the same period last year, a reduction of more than 51.7 million packs, or 25.8 percent.

The Department of Health (DOH) started implementing the Graphic Health Warning Law (GHWL) last March 3.

The law, Republic Act 10643, was supposed to be implemented in November last year, but the DOH moved the deadline to a later date to allow cigarette manufacturers to dispose of their old stocks without the graphic  warning and to provide them  time to print 12 graphic health warning templates on cigarette packs.

BIR officials said these visual health warnings make smokers aware of the serious health consequences if they continue smoking.

Distilled spirits like whiskey, brandy, and other hard drinks also registered lower sales – 27.4 million liters in March this year, compared to 31.4 million liters for the same month last year,  a reduction of about  four million liters, or 12 percent.

However, consumption of beer and other fermented liquors increase to 143.5 million liters in March this year, from 119.3 million liters in the same period last year.

The BIR said that collections on “sin products” for the first quarter of the year totaled P26.6 billion – P14.9 billion from cigarettes and P11.7 from liquors.

The P26.6-billion total amount is about P4.9 billion – or 22.7 percent – higher than the collection for the same period last year. (JCA) CT: DZRHNewsTV