by TESS BACALLA

	This mansion with a swimming pool at Maria Makiling Greenheights subdivision in Calamba is said to be owned by Rosemarie Ragasa, a BIR revenue district officer whose annual salary is P250,000. [PCIJ Photo]

AT THE Bureau of Internal Revenue, some officials and even lower-ranking personnel have been trying to appear younger than they really are. Between 1989 and the first quarter of 2001, in fact, 24 BIR personnel filed a petition with the Civil Service Commission for a change of their birth records.

This has nothing to do with vanity. Rather, bureau officials seem reluctant to let go of their posts at the mandatory retirement age of 65. The requests for the change in the birth records, if approved, would mean that the petitioners' stay at the BIR would be extended by one to five years.

Unfortunately, indications are that such reluctance has less to do with the desire to serve the public but more with the addiction to lifestyles that can be afforded only by those who rake in millions of pesos a year.

Like most government officials and personnel, the top monthly salaries at the BIR do not go beyond five figures. Thus, if a tax bureaucrat relies on just salary alone, it is unlikely he or she will be able to accumulate very much. Says retired BIR assistant commissioner Rizalina Magalona, who is well known in the bureau for her honesty: "Even P1 million (net worth) for us (in government) is big."

Yet several BIR officials are declaring net worths in the millions, while some personnel are now under official investigation for their alleged unexplained wealth. In most cases, these are personnel who deal directly with the taxpayers.

Take Beverly S. Milo, chief of the assessment division in Revenue District 8, Baguio City, who had a declared net worth of only P45,100 in 1990, when she joined the BIR as a revenue accountant. By 2001, this had grown to P2.6 million, which according to her detractors, may be an understatement.

At the very least, a preliminary investigation conducted by the BIR national office showed Milo as having "a massive increase in net worth for the years 1997 and 1998, and a decrease in 2001." It was further noted that she was appointed OIC of the Assessment Division on 1996.

The investigation was prompted by an anonymous complaint on Milo's allegedly having amassed numerous properties since she became a bureau employee. But Milo has denied all allegations against her, saying they are "malicious imputations which are intended to destroy not only me but also my family, friends and relatives."

Percival T. Salazar, Assistant Commissioner for Enforcement Service, had a declared net worth of P2.3 million in 2000 and P2.5 million in 2001. His asset statements for both years listed four properties-two in Novaliches, one in San Fernando, Pampanga, and another in Babac, Davao.

Salazar wrote the PCIJ that these are "well within my financial capacity income." He added that his wife has had her own source of livelihood since their marriage in 1958, "in the forms of rentals and agricultural income." Both of Salazar's 2000 and 2001 SALs, however, listed only one business in his SAL - Printing Phoenix Phils., where his wife is a stockholder.

In his 2000-2001 SALs, Salazar also described his Novaliches properties as residential in nature. A visit to his address in San Bartolome, Novaliches, however, revealed a three-story commercial building (although the third floor appeared to be the family's residence) that had a "For Rent" sign on it.

Salazar was also reported to have another property in Tungko, San Jose del Monte, Bulacan, consisting of a house and a mango orchard. But the BIR official denied this, saying that a "check with the Assessor's Office in Bulacan" would prove him right.

True enough, there was no record of Salazar owning property there. But a friend of the Salazars insisted that the family does own property in Tungko. A Tungko resident also said she was privy to the Salazars acquisition of the property, detailing how Salazar and his wife Remedios purchased two hectares of land in 1994 for P80 per square meter. Some time later, she said, the Salazars bought another parcel of land, measuring 2.5 hectares for P100 per square meter, in the same area. Total: P4.1 million.

Salazar, who is the president of the BIR Revenue Employees' Association or BIREA, explained that he has four children working in China and one in the United States. "They all remit part of their earnings for family projects," he wrote in a letter to PCIJ.

Former assistant commissioner Magalona says that a relatively higher net worth can still be grossly underdeclared, especially for someone known for having expensive hobbies. She cites the case of a former revenue district officer in Makati who signed up for membership with the Subic Yacht Club. At the time, she recounts, the membership fee was about P1 million.

Arnel A. Bernardo, formerly chief of the Tax Fraud division in BIR and now technical assistant to the regional director of Zamboanga, is a multimillionaire. He has the biggest declared net worth-P12.4 million in 1999 that leaped to P21 million in 2001 - among those whose SALs were obtained and examined by the PCIJ.

His cash on hand and bank deposits amounted to P3.6 million in 1999 and a whopping P10.4 million in 2001. His personal properties jumped from P5.3 million in 1999 to P12.1 million two years hence. No businesses appear in his SALs for 1999 and 2001, even though he listed his wife's occupation as "businesswoman."

Bernardo, who receives an annual salary of P269,000, has a three-story residential and commercial building in Sampaloc, Manila. "My net worth is a matter of record, and therefore something I never intended to hide," he said in a letter to PCIJ. "If I am confident to declare it for the public to know and verify, rest assured that the sources of whatever assets my wife and I presently have are completely legal."

Critics of the BIR say that given the amount of wealth being amassed by those working there, it is no wonder that many do not want to retire, at least not at the mandatory age.

David Alarcon, revenue district officer of Paco-Sta. Ana-Pandacan-San Andres, said though that all he was doing was rectifying a typo on an information slip when he petitioned the CSC to correct his birth record, and change the date from December 1, 1934 to December 1, 1939.

The information slip that contained what Alarcon said was the wrong date became the basis for his being included in the retirement list of BIR personnel for 1999. But because the CSC granted his petition, he will retire next year yet.

Alarcon claimed that "all my scholastic records" from Grade One to college and other records "clearly indicate that my date of birth is December 1, 1939."

But in a 2001 memorandum to then BIR Commissioner Rene Bañez, Inspection Service Assistant Commissioner Linda Simple pointed out that for years, Alarcon himself was writing different birth dates in official documents.

Observed Simple: "In an affidavit executed on January 4, 1960, Alarcon stated that his date of birth was December 1, 1935. In his Sworn Statements of Assets, Liabilities and Networth for 1961, he indicated that he was born on December 1, 1937. In his Personal Data Sheet (PDS) dated January 3, 1973, his date of birth was December 1, 1935, while [in] his PDS for 1996 . . . he stated that he was born on December 1, 1939."

The PCIJ also obtained a copy of a certification from the Land Transportation Office, dated January 30, 2003, that indicated Alarcon's birth date as December 1, 1935.

Another interesting case is that of Juanito Valdecantos, chief revenue officer III with the BIR's Taxpayers Assistance Service. In a transcript of the judicial hearing on the reconstitution of his birth record, Valdecantos was quoted as saying that his court petition to have his date of birth changed from June 26, 1935 to June 26, 1938 had been prompted by a requirement for him by the Department of Foreign Affairs to submit a birth certificate every time he traveled abroad. He said he tried to secure a certificate of live birth from his hometown, only to find out that records had been burned during the war.

Valdecantos said that two of his neighbors told him that his real birth year was 1938 and not 1935, something which they swore to in an affidavit. One of those neighbors turned out to be Gervacio Perez, father of Lema P. Valdecantos, the widow of Juanito Valdecantos's brother.

Lema is now reportedly Valdecantos's live-in partner. (A 1999 passport application for a child surnamed Valdecantos listed the parents as Juanito and Lema Valdecantos.)

Yet when Juanito Valdecantos applied for a renewal of his passport in July last year, he wrote down June 26, 1935 as his birthday. The same is true of a certification issued to him by LTO on February 7, 2003, which carries his original date of birth.

Going by his 1935 birth date, Valdecantos should have retired three years ago. Instead, he will retire next month, thanks to his rectified record of birth.

But the case of Aguinaldo L. Miravalles, acting regional director of Tuguegarao, Cagayan, is even more curious. Miravalles, who had a declared net worth of P4.38 million in 1999, is the former RDO of Caloocan City. In 1992, the CSC granted his petition to have his birth record changed from December 16, 1934 to December 16, 1938.

In his petition, Miravalles had said that he could get neither a birth certificate from the civil registrar in his hometown nor a baptism certificate. He then decided to secure an affidavit from his godparents, "who willingly certified that as far as they could remember, I was really born on December 16, 1938."

The PCIJ has a record from the National Archives certifying that Miravalles was born on December 15, 1932, which would make him 70 this year, way beyond the mandatory retirement age of 65. If he were born in 1935, he would be 68. But because the CSC granted his 1992 petition, the BIR considers Miravalles eligible for retirement only by December 16 this year.

On top of this, Miravalles does not even have civil service eligibility and is therefore not qualified to take his post. The CSC has issued a certification saying so, even if his Personal Data Sheet at the BIR claims he is eligible for the civil service. (Miravelles refused to answer PCIJ's questions.)

In her memorandum to Bañez, Simple quoted Atty. Raquel Buensanita of the CSC's Legal Affairs Office as saying that the granting of requests for change of birth records at the Commission is "pro forma, and does not usually take much time. She said that if the request is accompanied by the requisite documents . . ., the Legal Affairs Office will immediately draft a Resolution for the approval and signature by the Chairman and two Commissioners or at least by any two Commissioners."

Simple then proposed specific measures to "prevent unwarranted requests of revenue officers and employees" for correction of records of birth.

One such measure is to require the parties concerned to notify the BIR before filing their petition in court "so that it can coordinate with the Office of the Solicitor General or Fiscal's Office for any possible opposition." Another is to direct them to furnish the BIR with their request for correction "so it can submit its comment/opposition if the request appears unwarranted as shown by documents on file with the Bureau."

To date, not one of Simple's suggested measures have been adopted. Says a high-ranking BIR official: "Everything is status quo."