Mobiles, electronics, liquor, cigarettes, banned betel nuts, dangerous explosive chemicals pour into country through green channel
ISLAMABAD: Customs Today has been covering the green channel mega scam since many years. Senior customs officials have been denying their role in the Rs. 1,000 billion mega scam of green channel and avoiding answering specific questions related to the scam. If the senior customs officials are honest then why are they hiding facts from the nation? Why they are hiding that their senior customs official is also director in the green channel related software and security company PRAL? Why they were hiding that green channel is ‘mercilessly misused’ and that customs officials are involved in the mega scam and why DG Intelligence had to expose this fact?
Customs Today succeeded to prove its reports regarding green channel smuggling as Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar took notice of the issue and Directorate General Customs Intelligence & Investigation (I&I) admitted that green channel facility has been mercilessly abused by some syndicates in connivance with a few corrupt customs officers. The Supreme Court associate also wrote to Chairman NAB to take necessary action. After CJP’s notice, it is expected the Rs. 1,000 billion of the nation robbed by customs high officials would be returned to them.
Sources said we have now dug deep into the values and volumes of losses that Pakistan revenue is facing due to this mega scam of customs high officials. We have found that this is the biggest ever scam in the history of Pakistan. Pakistan can pay off all its debts in a matter of few years if only these green channel losses of Pakistan are controlled.
Sources said 17 questions were sent to the head of customs but he did not reply to the questions and was running away from it. Extensive research revealed that an FBR official at one instance has mentioned to media on how many containers are released under green channel without scanning or examination. The FBR official said that 700,000 consignments were released under green channel. He tried not to tell the number of containers. But experts say that each consignment is made up of 4 to 20 containers. Even if we take an average on the lower side then too it will be around 7 containers per consignment. This means 700,000 consignments x 7 containers per consignment = around 49 lac containers.
Sources said green channel scam started in 2011-2012. Hence, if we multiply the above figure to last 6 years of green channel clearances then it will be around 30 million containers. Even if take the figure on the lower side then too it will not be less than 10 million containers in green channel cleared without scanning and examination. So much of liquor, mobiles, electronic items, cigarettes, betel nuts, chemicals, etc. have been poured into the country through green channel. Pakistan has lost Rs. 1,000 billion and also millions of lives and properties due to this.
Sources said the FBR official in media reports claimed that 97% of goods in other countries are cleared in green channel while in Pakistan it is 47%. This is merely an attempt to mislead the media. In other countries, the concept of green channel itself is totally different from what some of the corrupt mafia of Pakistan Customs has made it. In other countries where 97% is cleared in green channel then 100% is scanned. This means a person cannot declare iron scrap while clearing liquor in it. This kind of clearance of liquor while declaring iron scrap is possible only in Pakistan green channel due to high corruption of some of the top customs officers.
Sources further revealed, in many other countries, they have only two channels; red and green. In red channel they do examination of each container and in green channel they scan the containers and also do random examination. But in Pakistan, the committee in charge of Risk Management System (RMS) cleverly kept three channels: red, yellow and green. The genuine importers of Pakistan have appealed to the NAB chairman Justice (r) Javed Iqbal and also to the new FBR Chairman Rukhsana Yasmeen to investigate regarding the people who controlled this committee and manipulated the green channel for ulterior motives.
Sources said random checking which is happening in green channel of the other countries happens in yellow channel in Pakistan. In fact, other countries scan 100% of their goods in green channel and in Pakistan scanning is not there even in yellow channel! This is why there is so much of misuse of yellow channel in Pakistan and even green channel is not possible to misuse in other countries like this. The kind of system made in green channel in Pakistan is obviously made so that the rich and powerful people can pay money to Customs high officials to get into the green channel and mint billions of rupees at the cost of national economy.
