Solon pushes to ban POGOs
HOUSE committee on appropriations vice chairman and Iloilo Rep. Janette Garin has urged the Senate and her co-legislators in the House of Representatives to immediately work on the banning of the Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations (POGO) amidst the controversies in the online gaming industry, including the recent spate of kidnappings, abductions and other illegal activities involving Chinese nationals.
Garin believed that said incidents have immensely affected the image of the Philippines and is driving away investors.
“Now that we are opening up our economy and kidnapping and human trafficking headlining our daily news, it is driving away investors considering that it’s creating a misinformation that the Philippines is not safe,” Garin said following the recent operation of the Philippine National Police Anti-Kidnapping Group where it rescued 42 Chinese nationals in Angeles City, Pampanga, under the suspicion that they were human trafficking victims.
The POGO sector in the country has been regarded as the knight in shining armor by the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR) as the government is earning additional revenues from their operations, but Garin pointed out that the crimes happening outweigh the benefits to the country.
“It has become a door to several crimes. The Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators hubs have become havens for undesirable aliens, drug and human trafficking, prostitution and other crime syndicates for money laundering and illicit operations,” Garin narrated.
Garin also backed the earlier statement of Finance Secretary Benjamin Diokno to discontinue the POGO since it has reputational risk.
“China and Cambodia have banned gambling because of the ill-effects it had brought and the Philippines should learn from their experience, we should not disregard the negative and deleterious effects that have risen with the continued operation of POGO in our country,” Garin explained.
Online gambling, viewed as the most dangerous tumor in modern society, began operating in the country in 2003 but it was only in 2016, after former President Rodrigo Duterte came to power, that the government began regulating online gaming hubs.
As of 2019, an estimated 138,000 Chinese nationals are reportedly working in Manila-based POGOs with 83,760 of them being holders of special work permits which allowed them to stay in the country for at most six months.
Only 17 percent of those employed in POGOs are Filipino nationals. But the number could be higher since there are estimated to be at least 200 POGOs operating without a permit.
