Tax credits granted to several textile companies from 2008 to 2014 that were later invalidated by the Commission on Audit (COA) now total to P3 billion.
A report by the COA Special Audits Office to Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said that it has disallowed another set of tax credit certificates (TCCs) worth P412.77 million, on top of the previous batches of TCCs it had invalidated amounting to P2.6 billion combined.
This brings the total value of illegal TCCs issued by the One-Stop-Shop Inter-Agency Tax Credit and Duty Drawback Center (OSS) to these textile firms to P3 billion as of Sept. 21, the date on the report sent to Dominguez by COA-Special Audits Office Director Gloria Silverio.
The errant textile firms with invalidated TCCs are Silvertex Weaving Corp. (SWC), Knitech Manufacturing Inc. (KMI), Capital-Roll Knit Corp. (CRC), Uni-Glory’s Knitting Corp. (UKC), Primeknit Manufacturing Corp. (PMC), Tai-Cheng Integrated Resource Inc. (TICIRI), Miskhu Industrial Corp. (MIC), and Universal Pacific Knitting Mills Inc. (UPKM).
SWC continues to top the list with the largest amount of illegal TCCs at PhP 906.80 million. CRC continues to top the list with the largest amount of illegal TCCs at P664.92 million.
The COA found a new set of TCCs that were illegally issued to MIC worth P315 million, on top of the P136.98 million in tax credits granted to the firm that were also invalidated by the audit body.
This brings the total value of MIC’s illegal TCCs to P451.98 million.
Illegal TCCs issued to PMC worth P97.77 million were also uncovered by the COA, aside from the P214.31 million granted to the firm that were invalidated.
PMC’s invalidated tax credits now total P312.08 million.
Aside from these textile companies, the COA has so far issued Notices of Disallowance (NDs) to the following firms with their corresponding amounts of illegally issued TCCs: CRC, with P664.92 million-worth of TCCs; KMI, with P114.20 million; UPKM, P127.81 million; UKC, P241.68 million; and TICIRI, P198.81 million.
Several past officials and employees of the Department of Finance (DOF), Board of Investments (BOI), Bureau of Customs (BOC), and OSS who were responsible for processing and approving the illegal TCCs issued between 2008 and 2014, as well as the recipients and claimants from the six companies, were held liable by COA.
Approved applications referred to tax credits on the duties and taxes that exporters supposedly paid, and they could then use the TCCs to pay other tax liabilities due the government.
The practice of these alleged exporters who illegally obtained TCCs was to sell the certificates to other companies at a discount.
The buyer-companies would then use the TCCs, which they had acquired at discounted prices, to pay their own tax liabilities.
The COA found that the OSS issued TCCs to either ghost exporters or real companies that were not in the export trade or did not deserve the tax credits issued to them, such as these six textile companies.
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