THE House Committee on Ways and Means, chaired by Rep. Joey Sarte Salceda (2nd District, Albay), on Tuesday adopted the motion of Rep. Rufus Rodriguez for the Bureaus of Internal Revenue (BIR) and Customs to file appropriate cases against the parties involved in the illegal importation of disposable e-cigarettes valued at P1.43 billion.
It was the third meeting of the panel, which tackled the matter by virtue of House Resolution (HR) 1437, which Rodriguez filed last November 2023. According to Rodriguez, the importers did not pay the excise tax and other duties for the entry of these products in the country.
“This ultimately redounds to a big loss in tax revenues intended for universal health care granting medical access to all Filipinos through the state-run Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth),” Rodriguez was quoted as saying.
In October 2023, Customs and other law enforcement personnel inspected a warehouse in Valenzuela City and discovered 1.4 million pieces of disposable e-cigarettes.
Salceda also shared the report of the Philippine delegation to the recent World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in Panama City, which raised the issue of the pending implementation of Republic Act 11900, s. 2022.
The law’s implementing rules and regulations (IRR) have yet to be issued, with the deadline for its issuance set on June 2024. It should be noted that RA 11900 provides that “non-issuance of the IRR shall not prevent the implementation” of the law.
RA 11900 is the “Vaporized Nicotine and Non-Nicotine Products Regulation Act.”
