Pacquiao duty-bound to pay PH taxes

The accountant and the legal adviser of the honorable member of the House of Representatives who is to become governor and retire as president claim that the Bureau of Internal Revenue is subjecting their client to “double taxation.”

What I understand about double taxation is a tax on the same income or property of a person in the same situs—for example, an income tax on my 2012 income in the Philippines where I am a resident and a citizen.

It is very clear that what Rep. Manny Pacquiao paid in the United States as income tax is for his income in the United States where he earned his prize money as a boxer. But as a citizen of the Philippines, he has to pay his income tax in the Philippines in accordance with the National Internal Revenue Code (NIRC), specifically under Section 24, to wit:

“(A) Rates of Income Tax on Individual Citizen and an Individual Resident Alien of the Philippines.

“(1) An income tax is hereby imposed:

“(a) On the taxable income defined in Section 21 of this Code, other than income subject to tax under Subsections (B), (C) and (D) of this Section, derived for each taxable year from all sources within and without the Philippines by every individual citizen of the Philippines residing therein.”

From this provision, it is clear that Pacquiao cannot claim that the taxes being imposed by the Bureau of Internal Revenue on the income he earned in the United States and for which he paid an income tax in the United States constitute double taxation. I humbly suggest that Pacquiao, because of his vast wealth, and a congressman and a religious person at that, just pay the taxes the BIR demands of him on his US income and claim as personal expenses the taxes he paid in the United States.

—EDUARDO A. TRINOS,

152 3rd Street,

Sto. Niño Executive Homes,

Barangay 3, Cabuyao,

Laguna 4025