Immediate closure of POGOs unreasonable to investors--Angara
Published Mar 25, 2023 04:03 am
Senator Juan Edgardo "Sonny" Angara said that a Senate committee report recommendation calling for the immediate closure of all Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs) was ‘’unreasonable’’ given its three-month phaseout period, which he called ‘’inadequate".
Angara, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, made this observation on a report by the Senate Committee on Ways and Means chaired by Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, which had conducted several public hearings on whether to ban or allow POGOs to continue operating in the country.
The Gatchalian committee has recommended the passage of a resolution "urging the Executive Department to cease the operations of POGOs immediately".
Angara said that three months is inadequate time for legitimate POGOs to wrap up operations, "especially for those who have made substantial investments".
"A longer period would be more reasonable/justified given it was also the government which invited them to invest in the first place," he stressed.
Angara has degrees from the London School of Economics, the UP College of Law, and Harvard Law School.
He echoed the concerns of Senate Deputy Majority Leader Joseph Victor "JV" Ejercito, who earlier said that he favors a two-to-three-year phaseout period for POGOs so as not to turn off potential investors.
The committee report, which currently lacks the numbers of signatories required to be elevated to the plenary, admitted that the Philippines is "the most attractive option for offshore gaming".
A study in 2018 cited by the committee report stated that "while Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia have cheaper real estate, and host locations for onsite gambling, these economies do not have what the Philippines have at the moment such as luxurious malls, hotels, and very accessible onsite casinos – which all attract wealthy tourists".
The committee report also cited Guangxi University Centre for Philippine Studies Director Chen Bingxiang, who explained that the apparent indispensability of POGOs to the Philippines "is due to the tax revenues and the development of the Philippine economy, as a whole, due to a widespread network of cottage industries that has cropped up around POGOs".
The Senate ways and means panel conceded that it is clear that the government "stood to gain economically from the burgeoning POGO industry – gaming tax, corporate and individual income taxes, value-added taxes, local government permits, fees and charges, increased demand for residential, office and commercial spaces, mushrooming of allied industries such as transportation, food and hospitality, job creation for direct and indirect employees, and the corporate gains of PAGCOR and CEZA that issued the licenses to POGOs, their service providers, and gaming agents".