Senator Cynthia Villar’s statement during the Public Hearing of the Committee on Justice and Human Rights joint with the Committees on Agriculture, Food, and Agrarian Reform; and Finance:
“In 2016, Congress passed RA 10817 ” The Agris Smuggling Act” which I authored. The cut of amount to be declared as economic sabotage and non-bailable if P10M for rice and P1M for other Agri-products.
I read in the papers of smuggling of more than cut off amount and yet no smugglers was charged with economic sabotage. In addition,during the onion crisis, the production cost of onion is at maximum of P25/kg and yet being sold at P600-P700/kg.
There is really hoarding, price manipulation and cartel. We are amending the Anti- smuggling Act to give more teeth to it and to include hoarding,price manipulation and cartel as economic sabotage and non-bailable.
We intend also to create an Anti-Smuggling Court to ensure the proper implementation of the law. This is the subject of the hearing today.”
For Senator Cynthia Villar, the only deterrent to smuggling in the country is to send smugglers behind bars while they are being tried before a special court.
Whether the smugglers are convicted or not, as long as they are jailed, Villar stressed when the Senate committees on justice and agriculture tackled on Tuesday her bill seeking the creation of anti-smuggling courts that will handle economic sabotage cases.
“Ang interest namin is criminal because this is economic sabotage, non-bailable. We want that because yung mga made-demanda dito mayayaman,” the senator pointed out during the hearing.
“The only magagawa mo sa kanila para mapatigil sila is makulong sila kasi yung mayayaman ayaw makulong,” said Villar, who is the richest member of the Senate.
The senator also pointed out that filing cases against smugglers would be futile if they could pay their way out of jail.
“That’s the only deterrent to smugglers that they be filed criminal cases and then makulong sila,” she said.
Being in jail while pending resolution of cases is already enough punishment against these smugglers, according to Villar.
“Kahit hindi namin sila masentensyahan but during the time of the period of the cases, nakakulong sila. That’s enough punishment for them because they are rich people. They don’t care about money. They earn a lot of money,” she went on.
The senator also sees no reason why the government would not spend money for anti-smuggling courts when it has been creating departments that “are purely overhead.”
Her proposal, on the other hand, would surely benefit the farmers and consumers and even the public as a whole in the long run, Villar stressed.
Under her bill, the anti-agricultural smuggling courts would be tasked to try cases involving smuggling, hoarding, profiteering and cartel of agricultural products. Senate of the Philippines/ Inquirer.net