Looking back to 33 years of faithful government service

As a lowly employee of the provincial treasury office in Daet, Camarines Norte, in the 1960s, I handled the real property tax collection campaign in the broadcast media and later the books of account of the province. This, even as I was enrolled at a local college and had to take night classes. I would later pass a series of civil service examinations and rise through the ranks—from chief of the accounting division to administrative deputy in 1974.

In 1976 the Ministry of Finance directed me to undergo a two-month training program for provincial and city treasurers at the Development Academy of the Philippines, Tagaytay City. In 1984 the finance minister appointed me assistant provincial treasurer of Camarines Norte. But the regional director of the Ministry of Local Government threatened to block my promotion if I rejected for the third time the training on Local Administration Development Program at the University of the Philippines, Manila. I was obliged to attend the program which started late February 1986 and lasted up to early April that same year, thus depriving me of time to write my thesis for a master’s degree in public administration which I was pursuing at Bicol University in Legazpi City at the time.

Eventually, in December 1986 I was appointed by then President Corazon Aquino city treasurer of Iriga City, from which I retired on Jan. 20, 1993, at the age of 65—after 33 years of faithful and honest service in government.

Even so, I am appalled that businessmen and business establishments do not issue official receipts for purchased commodities and services. Which means, they are cheating government of taxes which could be spent to alleviate the sufferings of the marginalized sector of our society and to fund infrastructure projects that would benefit them. Even if they do issue receipts, they do so only upon demand, but even then, the receipts are without duplicates. I suspect their books of accounts are handled by employees of the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

According to notices posted inside business establishments, customers should ask for official receipts for purchases, whether these be goods or services. Which reminds me of an incident when I bought a sack of rice worth more or less P1,500 in downtown Daet, for which no official receipt was issued for my payment.

—GODOFREDO O. PETEZA SR., J. P. Rizal Street, Barangay Camambugan, Daet, Camarines Norte