Office of customs and excise given more power
JAKARTA (JP): The government has issued new rulings giving more power to the Directorate General of Customs and Excise to implement the new customs and excise laws.
The new rulings empower the Directorate General of Customs and Excise to inspect, confiscate and seal both goods subject to excise and those subject to customs duties -- exports and imports.
"This power is administrative in nature, and is to ensure that all parties abide by the new customs and excise laws, to give legal certainty, to protect the people's interests and to provide a better business climate," the Ministry of Finance said in a statement.
The new rulings are Government Regulation No. 21/1996 on customs measures and Government Regulation No. 23/1996 on excise measures, copies of which were made available to The Jakarta Post over the weekend.
Under the new ruling on customs, the directorate general is empowered to stop and inspect exported or imported goods, the vehicles used to transport them, buildings or other places to store the goods as well as letters and other documents.
It is also authorized to confiscate and seal goods and the vehicles used to transport them.
To perform these duties, customs officials must be equipped with letters from the Director General of Customs and Excise, except for special occasions.
All costs resulting from inspections are to be borne by the freight forwarders, importers or exporters if convicted after it is proven that the inspected goods have violated the laws.
Confiscation
However, if there is no indication of any law violation, the customs office must bear all costs or losses caused by the inspection.
The customs office, however, may not confiscate packets or other goods sealed by postal offices or other law enforcement institutions. Also, it may not seize vehicles used to transport such goods, state-owned vehicles and foreign government-owned vehicles.
The owners of the goods or of the vehicles may lodge protests with the necessary documents or supporting evidence within 30 days of the confiscation of their goods or vehicles.
If within 90 days of exporters, importers or freight forwarders lodging their protests the finance minister does not respond, the protests will be considered accepted and the minister or the customs office has to satisfy all the rights of the protesters.
The ruling on customs measures has been effective since April 2. However, the customs law stipulates in Chapter 17 on the transition period that all customs matters not yet governed by the new regulations supplemented to the new law will be subject to the existing regulations until April 1, next year.
The ruling on excise matters is identical to the one on customs. But unlike the customs law, there is no article in the excise law governing the transition period.
To implement the customs and excise laws, the government has so far issued five government regulations -- two on customs and three on excise -- and 17 decrees of the Minister of Finance -- five on customs and 12 on excise. (rid)