PCSO execs face plunder raps over anomalous STL operations

Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) General Manager Jose Ferdinand Rojas II faces a plunder complaint before the Ombudsman for defrauding government at least P50 billion from the operations of the small-town lottery (STL).

Diego Magpantay, head of the anti-corruption taskforce of the Citizen’s Crime Watch, filed the complaint Thursday accusing PCSO board members Rojas, Francisco Manuel Joaquin III, Mabel Mamba, and Betty Nantes of plunder and graft over the anomalous operations of the STL.

READ: PCSO officials face P50-B plunder case

In a statement, Rojas said he is confident the plunder complaint which he described as “malicious” would be dismissed for lack of merit.

He added that the complaint was filed by persons who have “vested interests.”

“We at the PCSO board has introduced and put in place since 2010 reforms in the agency. This includes among others the different gaming activities such as the STL. The Governance Commission for GOCCs has in fact closely monitored the performance of the board annually. As such, we believe that the case filed against the board will be dismissed for being lack of merit. It can be considered as a malicious attempt to malign the board by people with vested interests,” Rojas said.

The complaint cited newspaper reports and the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) report which bared the use of “papelitos” or “lastillas” or small strips of paper, instead of the point-of-sale terminals (POST), a handheld gadget to record bets and transmit the record to the central data center.

The complainant also quoted the NBI as saying that STL operators use “rebisahan” or draw courts in places not registered by the PCSO, which resembles a “jueteng” operation.

The use of papelitos in violation of the STL implementing rules and regulations allows the STL operators to underreport their sales, making it impossible for the PCSO to determine the actual sales, the complaint said.

The use of papelitos also makes the STL games more prone to misdeclaration of revenues and abuses in the collection and remittance of bets, it added.

The complaint also cited the House of Representatives games and amusements committee investigation into the alleged anomaly, saying that the use of papelitos instead of the POST renders the revenues from STL beyond audit.

The complaint likewise cited the April 2015 Commission on Audit report that found STL corporations operating in Malilipot and Lipon, Albay and cities in Isabela which were not included in the list of authorized agent corporations and are thus unauthorized to run STL operations.

The complainant said the STL was supposed to stamp out the illegal numbers game by generating at least P103 billion annually. But a report from the PCSO gaming department shows that the STL operations only earned P4.7 billion in 2014.

The government said because the STL operations are not reporting its actual sales, the government stands to lose P50 billion annually with its continued operations.

“The STL was intended to eradicate the illegal numbers games called ‘jueteng’ ‘masiao’ etc. and hence it is safe to say that with the manifest failure of the STL operation to achieve its objective of eradicating illegal numbers game, taking into account the NBI investigation report, the PCSO or the government stands to lose at least P50 billion a year in revenues with the continued operation of the STL,” the complaint said.

The complainant said there is evidence that plunder is committed by the PCSO officials in the STL operations.

“From the newspaper publications and documentary evidence attached hereto, I came to the conclusion that with the continued operation of the STL, the crime of plunder is being committed. There is evidence of concerned PCSO officials conspiring with the STL operators to amass ill-gotten wealth…” the complaint said.

Earlier, the House of Representative games and amusements committee grilled NBI investigator  Ferdinand Manuel who said an NBI team raided STL offices in Bulacan, Zambales, Olongapo, Laguna, Batangas, Nueva Ecija and Quezon, and found several procedural lapses.

The NBI found the illegal use of papelitos, as well as the absence of sales terminals which allow operators to under-report their sales.

READ: NBI bares procedural lapses in small-town lottery operations

Earlier, the Inquirer quoted PCSO Chair Erineo “Ayong” Maliksi as saying that he had asked the agency to investigate STL operations following reports that some STL operators were using their licenses to conduct jueteng operations and not declaring actual sales to the PCSO.

“Approximated income from STL alone is P50 billion per annum nationwide, but the average income being declared by the STL operators in the past years is only around P4.7 billion,” Maliksi was quoted in the report.

He added that “based on the Gaming Product Development and Marketing Sector of the PCSO, the potential income of all illegal games, including the illegal declaration from STL, could be approximately P100 billion a year.”

STL outlets have been suspected of being a front for illegal gambling. Ironically, the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) started STL in 1987 to stamp out “jueteng,” an illegal numbers racket. Both involved betting on two-number combinations.