Lawlessness In Customs Costs Govt Dearly: Tyre Importer Says
April 18, 2015
A reputed tyre importer whose trade has been severely affected by a large-scale fraudulent tyre imports says that all his representations made to the Director General Customs has been completely overlooked, even without a acknowledgement notice served on the complaint made.
DGC Jagath Wijeweera
Further to the representations made to us by the said importer, we have launched our own investigations into this affair and now we can reveal that it is a plausible and real complaint, which leads to disclosure of massive scale revenue loss incurred by the government.
Customs adopt completely outlawed Customs Valuation System
It is revealed that despite a landmark judgment(CA/392/2012) recently pronounced by the Court of Appeal (October 2014), wherein it was declared that the valuation procedure adopted for customs purposes for the determination of value for imported goods is completely outlawed, arbitrary and in violation of the law governing the valuation of goods for Customs purposes, the Department of Customs has absolutely disregarded this court ruling and has failed to put in place a fool proof vibrant valuation process to determine the valuation of goods for customs purposes, in accordance with the GATT Valuation Agreement (Article VII).
Customs Valuation Directorate: the best money making chance
Our investigations reveals that the Valuation Directorate of the Customs Department is the best money making machine for the officers posted there and there is a big competition amongst the Customs Officers to get a placement there. We can disclose that the competition to get a placement there is such that the annual transfer list reaches the Minister of Finance for the final approval.
Customs Officers maintain their own valuation records for improper purposes
The credible information collected from the Customs House Agents on this exploitation reveals that officers serving in the Valuation Directorate maintain their own ‘private valuation data records’ for improper purpose of demanding inducements from the importers. In most cases these ‘private valuation data records’ represent true transaction value declared for the Customs purposes by the genuine importers, which is naturally much higher than the values declared for similar goods imported by fraudulent elements.
