So Paolo and I were talking about the most corrupt government agencies in the Philippines.

The BIR and the BOC come to mind. (I mean, the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Bureau of Customs. According to the PCIJ, Paolo says, these two agencies are considered the most corrupt.)

The reason we get to talking about these government agencies is our topic tomorrow for the show I’m producing is on taxation. On April 15, everyone has to pay their taxes, or else… I am not sure as to how I should approach this topic. Nobody really likes to pay taxes. Most people in the Philippines just think that their hard-earned money would just end up in the pockets of corrupt government officials.

This conjecture is only partly true. Of course, not all of the government officials are corrupt, but a lot of them are.

And it’s not helping that we are having problems with our budget this year. There’s a deficit, which is a big surprise. Part of it is due to the inefficient tax collection last year. Not enough taxes were collected. We’ll have to raise close to 380 billion to make it this year, what with the global financial crisis and the El Niño phenomenon.

But back to the BIR, the BOC and corrupt government agencies.

I have no stomach to feel disgust for them. Corruption is commonplace here. Nothing shocking. How do we talk about something we can do nothing about? We joke about it. There’s no other way to deal with it.

So I say, “The BOC. Those guys can own Maseratis or Lamborghinis! I wanna work there!”

“Yeah, the lucky bastards.” Paolo says, “I want a Volkswagen.”

“Yeah. Two of my neighbors own the old school Volkswagen.”

“I want the old school Volkswagen.”

“Yeah… Either that, or Mr. Bean’s car.”

Mr. Bean's Mini

I’ve always been partial to Mr. Bean’s car. The lime-yellow Mini. Why do I like it? Well, my mother and my brother and I used to stay up late watching Mr. Bean when I was a kid. So my mother, and my brother and I are probably very different people, and now, we aren’t what you would call friends, but I could hold on to the memory that when I was a kid, at night before it was time for bed, my mother would let us watch TV, and the only show we could agree on was Mr. Bean.