BIR Ruling [DA-163-02]

September 16, 2002 BIR RULING [DA-163-02] Defensor Teodosio Daquilanea & Ventilation Law Offices Suite 304, Third Floor, UEC Bldg., Corner J.M. Basa-Mapa Streets, Iloilo City Attention: Atty. Samson L. Averia Counsel for Felicito Dolar, Jr. Gentlemen : This refers to your letter dated April 16, 2002 requesting in behalf of your client, Felicito Dolar, Jr., for a reconsideration of the decision laid down in BIR Ruling No. DA-223-2001 dated October 25, 2001, wherein the claim for informer's reward of your client has been denied on the ground that the latter has a relative in the Bureau of Internal Revenue. In reply, please be informed that Section 1 of Finance Regulations No. 1 provides, viz : "Section 1. Who may qualify as informers for reward. Section 1 of Republic Act No. 2338 provides that (a) An informer must not be an internal revenue or customs official or employee, or other public official; and (b) He must not be related within the sixth degree of consanguinity to an internal revenue or customs official or employee, or other public official. This means that the father, mother, children, grandchildren, grandfather, grandmother, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, first cousins and second cousins of internal revenue and custom officials and employees or other public officials cannot qualify as informer." (emphasis supplied) Section 282(A) of the 1997 Tax Code likewise provides that "any person, except an internal revenue official or employee, or other public official or employee, or his relatives within the sixth degree of consanguinity , who voluntarily gives definite and sworn information, not yet in the possession of the Bureau of Internal Revenue, leading to the discovery of frauds upon the internal revenue laws or violations of any of the provisions thereof, . . . shall be rewarded . . . ." It is clear from the aforequoted provisions of law and regulations that a person cannot qualify as informer if he/she is related within the sixth degree of consanguinity to an internal revenue or customs official or employee, or other public official. It should be noted also that the rule in statutory construction is that a statute is not open to construction as a matter of course. It is open to construction only where the language is ambiguous, or where it will admit of two or more constructions or is of such doubtful or obscure meaning, that reasonable minds might be uncertain or disagree as to its meaning. Where the language of a statute is plain, clear and definite, there is no need to resort to the rules of statutory construction. An unambiguous statute is to be applied, not to be interpreted since it already speaks for itself. Any attempt to make it clearer is a futile endeavor and will only give rise to obscurity. ( 50 Am. Jur., pp. 204, 205) IECAaD Your client therefore, is not qualified as an informer, as enunciated in BIR Ruling No. DA-223-2001 dated October 25, 2001 because he has an uncle named Edgar Allan D. Del Rosario, who is a permanent employee of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) holding the position of Revenue Officer IV who entered the Bureau on September 11, 1989, as certified by the Personnel Division of BIR. This constitutes our final decision on the matter. Very truly yours, Commissioner of Internal Revenue By: (SGD.) MILAGROS V. REGALADO Assistant Commissioner Legal Service