MANILA, Jan 15 (NNN-PNA) – Philippine President, Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos, has ordered government agencies to step up the fight against “rampant smuggling” in the country, the presidential communications office (PCO), said yesterday.
In a statement, the PCO said, Marcos wants reform in the bureaucracy, to curb smuggling, lower logistics costs, and ensure ease of doing business, as his administration works to prop up investments and business activity in the country.
During a recent meeting, Marcos said that, government agencies must do something to address rampant smuggling.
“To be brutally frank about it, we have a system, but they are not working. The smuggling here in this country is absolutely rampant. So it does not matter to me how many systems we have in place; they do not work,” Marcos said.
“So we really have to find something else. We cannot continue to depend on these systems, which have already proven quite ineffective,” he added, stressing the need to fix the systems.
He also said, issues on the ease of doing business and the inefficiency of the country’s airports and seaports, are the major complaints that he is receiving from the business sector.
Marcos urged concerned agencies to be more innovative, stressing, the government has to delineate functions or establish new agencies, if necessary.– NNN-PNA