MANILA, Philippines--Exemption of the Home Mutual Development Fund, more commonly known as the Pag-IBIG Fund, from corporate income tax and the Salary Standardization Law is being pushed in the House of Representatives. Aimed at strengthening Pag-IBIG and enable it to better provide financing services to its growing number of members, three bills are pending in the House—House Bills 410, 1097 and 2922—authored by Representatives Eduardo Zialcita, Emil Ong and Rodolfo Valencia, respectively. Besides exemption of Pag-IBIG from the Salary Standardization Law and corporate income tax, the bills also call for mandatory membership to Pag-IBIG of all public and private sector employees. House Bill No. 1097 specifically states that those to be covered by mandatory membership are employees covered by the state-run pension funds Social Security System, the Government Service Insurance System, the Armed Forces of the Philippines, the Philippine National Police and overseas Filipino workers, among others. A technical working group in Congress is consolidating the bills into one. The Department of Finance has been asked to comment on the proposal to strengthen Pag-IBIG, especially on the provision seeking to exempt it from the corporate income tax. It has yet to release its stand on the matter, but a draft position paper sounded off its reluctance to agree on exempting Pag-IBIG from the 35-percent corporate income tax. The department has said allowing Pag-IBIG not to pay taxes would run counter to the tax code, which requires state-owned companies to pay income tax. Representative Zialcita, of the first district of Parañaque City, said making Pag-IBIG pay income tax would be a disservice to members of the fund. “There is an urgent need to further strengthen the power of the Fund to ensure that it will continually grow and generate a pool of savings,” he said in his bill’s explanatory note. “The benefits derived from this pool of funds ... can only rebound to the general welfare and interest of the Fund’s nearly 4.9 million members nationwide. Michelle V. Remo; with editing by INQUIRER.net ___________________________________________________________________ |
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