MANILA – Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon has thumbed down any plan by the country’s economic managers to impose new tax or raise taxes by next year with the country still under the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
According to Drilon, instead of burdening the Filipino people with new or higher taxes, the government should proceed with the sale of government properties and the privatization of the gaming industry to repay the debts incurred on COVID-19 response.
“We will oppose it. We are still grappling with the impact of the pandemic today and we do not see our country to begin recovery until the third quarter of 2021 for them to talk about raising and imposing new taxes by next year,” the Ilonggo senator said.
“To raise or impose new taxes next year will be counterproductive and it will only be an added burden to Filipinos and businesses who are striving hard to get back on their feet,” he added.
Drilon also noted that there are still 90,000 business establishments that remain close to this day, most of them are micro, small and medium enterprise, 7.3 million Filipinos who lost jobs to the pandemic, and 7.7 million families who are hungry.
The Ilonggo senator further said that, to help the government generate money to repay its growing debt obligations, it can dispose public assets such as Camp Aguinaldo and Camp Crame.
“We must put more money in people’s pockets, not take their hard-earned money by raising taxes,” he said. “A tax hike or a new tax will further hurt the people and the businesses during this extraordinary time in our history as a nation.”/PN
