MANILA — Bureau of Customs (BOC) Commissioner Isidro Lapena on Monday inspected the two warehouses where most of the contents of the 105 illegally withdrawn containers at the Asian Terminal Inc. (ATI) container yard were delivered.
With this, he said that Customs police are now deployed at the warehouses located in Meycauayan, Bulacan to prevent release of shipments.
Thirty-two twenty-footer containers which were subject of alert order were found on March 20 inside the first warehouse located at Homms Blk. 2, Lot 3 Phase 5 Sterling Industrial Park, Libtong, Meycauayan, Bulacan.
“The BOC raiding team together with Local Government Unit of Brgy. Libtong and PNP Meycauayan found a warehouse full of crates of tiles and several logbooks with dates of arrival of containers and their container numbers,” Lapena said in a statement Monday.
Another adjacent warehouse located at Smartylane St., Sterling Industrial Park, Barangay Libtong, Meycauayan, Bulacan, also subjected to inspection, revealed numerous crates of tiles which are identical on the first warehouse.
“No logbook was found by the agents. However, these tiles could be part of the goods contained in the illegally withdrawn containers due to its similarity in the tiles found at the first warehouse,” the BOC chief added.
Both warehouses are reportedly owned by Homms Trading Corporation.
Lapena said that the contents of 85 containers were already located while BOC is still searching for the whereabouts of the remaining 20 containers.
Upon inventory, the Office of the District Collector found out that 103 containers were illegally released without clearance on March 17 while the two containers were immediately apprehended prior to its exit at terminal gates. The shipments all came from China.
Lapena clarified that alerted shipments are subject to 100-percent physical examination and only his office is allowed to authorize release of the alerted shipments.
The bureau will investigate the BOC and ATI personnel involved in the release of the alerted shipments. (PNA)
