House ways and means panel says Buñag can still deliver
By Jodeal Cadacio
Reporter

EMBATTLED Internal Revenue Commissioner Jose Buñag found an ally Tuesday in two senior members of the House of Representatives, including the chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means, who defended him against calls for his resignation in light of what has been perceived as his agency’s anemic tax collections.
       Nationalist People’s Coalition Rep. Jesli Lapus of Tarlac said it would be premature to demand Buñag’s resignation, and that the latter should be given a chance to prove his worth.
       Lapus, together with his vice chairman, Lakas Rep. Exequiel Javier of Antique, expressed confidence that Buñag would be able to redeem himself and turn his bureau around by achieving its overall collection target of P546.9 billion.
       Lapus and Javier stressed that at this point when the administration has started implementing fiscal reforms, the BIR under Buñag’s leadership needs all the public support that it can get to push up collection and wipe out the deficit.
       Lakas Rep. Joey Salceda of Albay, chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations, has called for Buñag’s ouster after the BIR incurred an P7-billion deficit last month.
       In defense of Buñag, Lapus said that the BIR’s collection of P206.43 billion as of last April was P33.1 billion more than what was collected for the same period last year. This represented a 19.1-percent growth in BIR collections, he said.
       He said that revenues collected in April, the month for filing of personal income tax, reached P71.4 billion, or 13 percent higher than the actual collection for the same period last year.
       Notwithstanding the huge collection, the BIR’s total collection as of last month was still off target, and some officials had earlier attributed this to the fact that very high targets had been set in the first place, even while the tools for improving collection have not yet been set in motion.
       Lapus said he remained confident that the BIR still has a fighting chance to achieve its second quarter collection target of P189.8 billion.
       He said among the reasons cited by the BIR for the April shortfall were the increase in the use of withholding tax credits to offset tax payments; higher utilization of tax credit certificates, lower corporate income tax payments since many firms remitted the bulk of their payments in the first three quarters of 2005, and the increase in the use of minimum corporate income tax payments for “loss” years to avoid their expiration.
       “The one-month collection shortfall in April could be explained, since collection target refinements are in order due to higher noncash revenues, which are nonetheless still revenues,” Lapus said.