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29 March 2024

Kris Aquino tops dollar billionaires as biggest taxpayer in Philippines

Kris Aquino,youngest sister of Philippines President Benigno Aquino III.

Published
By Correspondent

With her string of failed relationships and overt display of emotional baggage on TV, people either hate or love Kris Aquino, with nothing in between, as some showbiz kibitzers want to believe.
 
The 42-year-old youngest sister of Philippines President Benigno Aquino III (he has three other sisters), however, is the darling of government tax collector, as she topped the list of taxpayers for 2011, beating even the Filipino US dollar-billionaires on Forbes list.
 
Smart Communications Inc, meanwhile, topped the list of corporate and institutional taxpayers for 2011 by paying government 10.23 billion pesos (Dh910.9 million ; $248 million) in taxes, followed by Manila Electric Co (Meralco) at 8.3 billon pesos (Dh738m; $201.21m).
 
Kris Aquino, who recently hogged the headlines again over her legal feud with ex-husband James Yap, a professional basketball player, paid 49.87 million pesos (Dh4.44 million; $1.21 million) in taxes for 2011, according to the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR).
 
She is one of the top earners, if not the highest earner, in the Philippine entertainment industry, what with her numerous product endorsements and three TV shows.
 
Others in the top five among corporate taxpayers were Shell Philippines Exploration BV and Chevron Malampaya LLC, which are both involved in the Malampaya natural gas project offshore the central Philippine province of Palawan, and the dairy firm Nestlé Philippines Inc.
 
The country’s largest beer producer, San Miguel Brewery, was in the sixth place while cigarette firm Philippine Morris Fortune Tobacco Corp was eighth and Philex Mining Corp, the country’s biggest gold and copper producer, placed 10th.
 
None of the Chinese-Filipino tycoons, who are regularly mentioned by Forbes as among the world’s US dollar-billionaires, were among the top ten in the list of Top 500 individual taxpayers posted by BIR on its website.
 
BIR Commissioner Kim Henares told reporters that by publishing the lists of taxpayers by region, her office hopes to inform the people as to who among the rich are paying their taxes honestly.
 
“What we’re saying to people is: ‘You know who the rich people in your cities, in your communities, are,” she was quoted by the ‘Philippine Daily Inquirer’ as saying. “If they’re not on these lists, you have to wonder why. The lists also serve as guides for our regional offices.”

The country’s richest person, mall owner Henry Sy Sr, was 15th on the BIR list while Lucio Tan, a beer and tobacco magnate and the second-richest man in the Philippines, was ranked 35th. Real-estate magnate David Consunji, who also appeared on the Forbes list for the first time this year, was the 176th biggest taxpayer.
 
The other businessmen on the list were Orlando Vea of Smart Communications, who placed 16th, and TV5 CEO Ray Espinosa at 20th.
 
(The complete list of Top 500 individual taxpayers is available at: <https://www.inquirer.net/videos/business/Top-500-Taxpayers-in-2011-(from-BIR).pdf>)
 
Gregory Deane Reichow, vice president of Sunpower Philippines, followed Aquino on the list with 38.2 million pesos (Dh3.4 million; $925,613) and then Lauro Baja Jr, formerly the country’s permanent representative to the UN and now head of the Philippine unit of the Swiss Bank UBS, who paid 34.26 million pesos (Dh3.05 million; $830,143).
 
Chairman of Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co (PLDT) Manuel V Pangilinan was the fourth-largest taxpayer at 25.99 million pesos (Dh2.31 million; $628,755), followed by Aurelio Montinola III, president and CEO of Bank of the Philippine Islands, at 24.47 million pesos (Dh2.18 million; $592,925).
 
The others who landed in the Top 10 of the biggest taxpayers for 2011 were Gerardo Ablaza, president of Manila Water; Philippine Ambassador to Portugal Philippe Lhuillier; Victor M Angeles; Roberto Panlilio, of JP Morgan Chase & Co; and GMA Network Chairman and CEO Felipe Gozon.