‘Loterya’ queue grows as ‘jueteng’ untouched

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO— A total of 197 corporations and cooperatives, including 21 Small Town Lottery (STL) agents, have applied for permits to operate the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office’s lottery games, which would replace STL as the state’s countermeasure against  “jueteng,” an official said on Thursday.

Thursday was the last day for PCSO to receive applications to run the Loterya ng Bayan, said Liza Gabuyo, officer in charge of PCSO’s lottery games, in a phone interview.

The Loterya was meant to put an end to the illegal numbers racket jueteng, which continues to thrive in many parts of the country, including southern parts of Metro Manila and Luzon.

The National Bureau of Investigation arrested eight jueteng workers on June 16 in Muntinlupa City and charged them the next day, which indicated that jueteng was far from being eliminated.

Jueteng, according to sources, continues to thrive as a result of payoffs to top police officials in Metro Manila through the operations of a certain Allan Manuela. A certain Bernardino, the sources said, has been collecting the weekly take of top PNP officers, which the sources said placed at up to P400,000 a week for the highest ranking officer.

According to Gabuyo, it would take at least a month to evaluate applicants for Loterya.

PCSO created the Loterya after the Senate investigated reports that STL provided a legal cover for jueteng in 2010.

PCSO’s scheduled roll-out of Loterya has been delayed by eight months now since October 2010 when PCSO officials first informed senators of the new game and its set of implementing rules and regulations (IRR).

Gabuyo said the delay was due to revisions in the IRR and the extension given to applicants to complete paper work.

The selection process, she said, is stringent. Among the documentary requirements is a feasibility study that demands information on illegal numbers games in the proposed area, the estimated daily sales there and financial statistics on presumptive monthly retail receipts.

In Central Luzon, police said STL is still popular. PCSO introduced STL in Central Luzon provinces where jueteng is known to thrive, but it ended up being used as a cover for the illegal numbers racket.

According to a report submitted by the police’s directorate for intelligence to the Senate last year, seven regions where STL operated generated monthly gross sales amounting to P2.575 billion.

The selection of areas for Loterya will be based on the actual test run of STL, the viability of Loterya and their experience with illegal numbers games, according to the IRR approved by the PCSO board in February.

Loterya has three different games: EZ2, Swer3 and Pares. EZ2 players bet on a pair of numbers from 1 to 31. A bet of P5 entitles a winning player to P2,000.

Swer3 players must select three numbers from 0 to 9. A successful bet of P5 earns the player P2,250.

Pares players must draw a pair of numbers from 1 to 38, and a P5 bet could win P4,000. Tonette Orejas, Inquirer Central Luzon