China is urging President Rodrigo Duterte to crack the whip on the
rising Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGO) because of its
adverse impact on mainland Chinese.
In a statement, China revealed the negative effect of POGOs that
target mainly Chinese gamblers in the mainland where gambling was
banned.
” According to the Chinese laws and regulations, any form of gambling
by Chinese citizens, including online-gambling, gambling overseas,
opening casinos overseas to attract citizens of China as primary
customers, is illegal,” the Chinese embassy said.
The embassy claimed “gambling-related funds flowing illegally out
China and into the Philippines amounts to hundreds of millions of
Chinese Yuan(Renminbi) every year” with a big chunk going to the real
estate sector. The POGO maret is worth an estimated P300 billion a
year.
It claimed these funds were being funneled from China to the
Philippines via “cross-border money laundering through underground
banking, which undermines China’s financial supervision and financial
security.”
The embassy also cited the woeful conditions of illegal Chinese who
“are subjected to what media described as ‘modern slavery’ due to
severe limitation of their personal freedom.”
“Their passports are taken away or confiscated by the Philippine
employers. They are confined to live and work in certain designated
places and some of them have been subjected to extortion, physical
abuse and torture as well as other ill-treatments,” the Chinese
embassy said. “At the same time, dozens of kidnappings and tortured
cases of Chinese citizens who gamble or work illegally in gambling
entities in the Philippines have taken place. Some Chinese citizens
were physically tortured, injured or even murdered,” it added.
The embassy said crimes and social problems have increased in China
due to the large number of Chinese citizens lured into POGO casinos.
“In particular, some gambling crimes and telecom frauds are closely
connected, which has caused huge losses to the victims and their
families,” said the embassy.