The Bureau of Customs has reportedly achieved what other government agencies have not. It has become compliant with the Anti-Red Tape Law. The Bureau claims transactions that used to take days to complete can now be finished in just a matter of hours. Congratulations to the BOC if this is true and not just another press release.
All government agencies should prioritize the elimination of red tape. Their commitment to making their processes more efficient would reflect their determination to rid their offices of graft and corruption. Conversely, their determination to maintain inefficiencies would just expose their commitment to graft and corruption.
I wonder which comes first. Inefficiencies in the system or corruption? Do grafters look for kinks in the system where they can apply their corrupt practices? Or do they convert efficient systems to suit their evil designs?
I’m pondering these questions because determining how red tape creeps in to a system is an important step towards finding suitable countermeasures. Take the first situation. If there are loopholes in the system the obvious solution would be to plug them. I think for the second situation the simplest solution is to kick out those who initiated the conversion from efficiency to inefficiency. Of course, these are all overly simplified. In the real world, the situations are likely to be more complicated and the required solutions more difficult to implement.
In any case, the key to addressing red tape and the attendant graft and corruption is political will. If it is really true that the Bureau of Customs is now red tape-free then clearly it has already exercised its political will. Are our other agencies up to the task?
All government agencies have one claim or another of eliminating red tape. I don’t think this is the first time that the BoC or any other agency has announced that it has eliminated red tape.
Better yet, why don’t they eliminate desks and the drawers that go with it. Make their employees wear transparent clothing and subject them to body cavity searches. Also, make sure that their bank accounts are posted on the internet for all to see.
I’ll believe there is no graft and corruption in the BoC the very day that I don’t see rich customs officials.
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i’m not sure if you’re trying to be funny but i see value in what you’re saying. at least, you’re providing us with some out-of-the-box suggestions, which are very much welcome in this blog. the idea of transparent drawers is a good one. if i’m not mistaken i think this has been done in Marikina.
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You’ll have to forgive my smart aleckiness. I really can’t help it.
But to ask something about the Bureau of Customs drive against red tape, did they say specifically how they become compliant with the Anti-Red Tape Law?
I think it would help your readers, including me, if you gave more information about the Anti-Red Tape Law.
I’ll be reading up on the law itself but I doubt if I’ll post anything regarding this. My knowledge about this is limited to the time when I worked with Pag-IBIG Fund and had to write a Press Release saying that the Fund had cut down on the number of signatures needed for the approval and release of loans. I can’t remember the exact figure right now, but I think it was like from 50 down to 22.
Did the BoC do the same thing?
In any case,and you will agree, cutting red tape is only part of the solution to ridding the government of graft and corruption.
You may have less red tape, but what about smuggling?
I’ve heard of Deputy Commissioner Reynaldo Umali’s work with the RATS program and despite its vaunted success (if you will believe it), a lot of smuggling still happens.
True, the BoC can only act on the smuggling that happens through our ports and they would contend that the larger smuggling happens outside of our ports.
So, perhaps, in posing a solution to smuggling, we may need to attend to the much bigger problem of policing our shores and sealanes. That’s a tough job for our rinky dink Coast Guard and Navy who must patrol such a huge area with the very limited number of ships that they have.
That is unless we can somehow breed hundreds of thousands of super Coast Guard men and Super Navy men who can all swim four times faster than Michael Phelps. They can all patrol our shores and sealanes sans the need for boats, and more over, win our country acclaim in the next Olympics!!
Yahooo!
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maybe i wasn’t articulate or clever enough to convey my sarcasm. i wasn’t actually praising the boc. as for the anti-red tape law, i make no pretense of having any deep understanding of this particular law. the full text is here http://www.cibac.org/RA9485.pdf.
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Oh…
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