Court asked to summon Comm. Guerrero

THE Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) is set to rule on a petition asking the appearance of Bureau of Customs (BOC) commissioner, Rey Leonardo Guerrero by way of a ‘subpoena’ to explain the bureau’s continuing inability to implement the multi-million automation project that the petitioner had won some 6 years ago, in 2015.

In a two-page decision last November 3, 2021, Hon. Judge Paulino Q. Gallegos, presiding judge of Branch 47, gave 10 days to Guerrero and the head of the Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM), to respond to the petition filed by the joint venture (JV) of Omniprime Marketing and Intrasoft International, which won the bidding for the bureau’s ‘Integrated Enhanced Customs Processing System’ (IECPS) project in 2015, during the previous administration of Pres. Benigno ‘Noynoy’ Aquino.

Although Omniprime/Intrasoft was declared the winner during the bidding supervised by the PS-DBM, it was not implemented when Alberto Lina was appointed by Aquino as customs chief in April 2015.

The JV bested the joint venture of E-Konek Philippines and Web Fontaine Group, which presently still maintains the BOC’s ‘E2M’ (electronic-to-mobile) assessment lodgment system.

E-Konek is a company owned by Lina, together with another former customs commissioner, Guillermo Parayno, who was an appointee of Pres. Fidel Ramos (1992 -1998).

Atty. Jess Raymund Lopez, who made a “special appearance” for Web Fontaine did not object to the court’s decision, it noted.

Both Lina and Parayno were subsequently sued by Omniprime/Intrasoft before the Ombudsman for “manifest partiality,” “conflict of interest and bad faith” for favoring the continuance of the E2M despite the result of the bidding they won (see also Pinoy Exposé Volume 2, Issue No. 43).

A separate civil case, Civil Case No. 15-134333, was also filed by the joint venture before the Manila RTC and which landed in the sala of Judge Gallegos.

Although the BOC, PS-DBM and the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) dragged the case up the Supreme Court, the latter, in a final ruling in June 2018, upheld Judge Gallegos’ previous ruling where he enjoined “all the respondents from initiating any other procurement, sourcing of funds and conducting any other procurement whether thru public bidding or negotiation to replace or upgrade the present customs systems subject matter of this bid.”

The court made a ‘final entry of judgement,’ meaning, the ruling can no longer be appealed by any party, last January 29, 2021.

Atty. Israelito Torreon, one of the counsels for Omniprime/Intrasoft, in a message to Pinoy Exposé, said they are now compelled to seek the court’s intervention for Guerrero’s explanation on learning that the customs chief had requested Congress for P96 million for the maintenance and “stabilization” of the E2M for next year.

He also averred that the E2M is also the same as the IECPS that they won in 2015 “but only under a different name.”

He added that despite the ruling made final and executory, both the OSG and the BOC continue to file court petitions “clearly intended to delay the project’s implementation and subvert the ruling of the court.”

Atty. Vincent Maronilla, BOC spokesperson, said that while they take cognizance of the court ruling, implementing the same may not be possible at this time since there was “no budget available” for the IECPS.

“Nasa Senado na ang budget request ng BOC and we cannot go back to Congress at this point.” Siguro for next year, we can attend to this,” he told Pinoy Exposé.