Enriles: POGO ban should not 'destroy' CEZA operations, offshore gaming

Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile and his daughter, Chief Executive Officer Katrina Ponce Enrile of the Cagayan Economic Zone Authority, said President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr.’s decision to ban Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) should not destroy CEZA operations, including its offshore gaming licensees.

The father and daughter tandem personally made the appeal before the House probe on crimes related to POGO on Wednesday, saying that protecting CEZA, including its offshore gaming licensees that CEZA identifies as interactive gaming (iGaming) operators, is in the best interest of the country.

The Enriles argued that unlike the POGOs licensed by the state-run Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR), the foreign iGaming operators licensed by CEZA all operate legally and are prohibited from soliciting and accepting bets from the Philippines and other countries where gambling is prohibited.

“[The area managed by CEZA] is the anchor of the safety and national security of the country to protect it. When we do our things as legislators....I am leaving you, I might be dead tomorrow, I will not care, but you have to care about your children and grandchildren. [You must think] how to provide them with their livelihood and how to keep them safe from other countries. Every country around us is our enemy [or] potential enemy. No exceptions. And that's why I beg those who have in their minds to destroy CEZA, please stop it," said Enrile, who turned 100 last February.

“There is a purpose for CEZA. Until today, that purpose is being pursued. That is the message I want to give,” Enrile, the author of the CEZA charter, added.

In his 3rd State of the Nation Address, Marcos banned all POGOs in the country. The President said POGOs had ventured into illicit areas such as scamming, money laundering, prostitution, human trafficking, kidnapping, torture, and murder.

Further, Katrina Ponce Enrile stressed that CEZA has authority to conduct offshore iGaming operations since it can register enterprises organized or domiciled in the Philippines or any foreign country as provided under its Charter, a law principally authored by her father, a former senator.

In addition, she said CEZA requires its iGaming operators to observe IP (Internet Protocol) and financial blocking of attempted access from the Philippines to ensure that these offshore iGaming operators won’t be able to accept bets from the Philippines and other countries where gambling is illegal,

“The iGaming activities of CEZA do not in any way negatively affect, influence, nor contribute to the proliferation of gambling activities in the Philippines. It is our fervent hope that the ills and evil that the President rightly sought to end with his decisive action to ban POGOs will not be to the detriment of CEZA,” she said.

“It will be a great disservice to the President and the rest of our stakeholders if CEZA is unable to clarify and distinguish our business from that of PAGCOR,” she added.

IMPORTANCE TO EDCA

In addition, the Enrile scion said the iGaming support service, systems and data/content streaming providers, are all duly registered in the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), and have been existing beyond reproach for the longest time that a location within CEZA was even chosen to be one of the sites of the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) between Manila and Washington DC.

The EDCA is a pact which grants US military personnel and their equipment access inside Philippine military facilities for the pre-positioning of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief and the enhancement of their individual and collective defense capabilities.

“The [iGaming licensees] service providers inside CEZA have been there before EDCA was signed and way before the determination of EDCA sites. Hence, it would be safe to assume that the military knows of the presence of gaming service providers, and despite this knowledge, they still chose an area inside CEZA to be one of their EDCA sites. This shows their confidence that the area is safe and secured,” the younger Enrile said.

Further, The CEZA CEO said that an iGaming operator seeking to secure a license from CEZA is required to submit an application, pass a personal and company probity by an independent and globally recognized probity evaluator, and then submit a software testing certificate from a credible and globally recognized software testing laboratory.

Once all these documentary requirements are complete, that is the only time when the operators will now have to pay the licensing fee, according to the younger Enrile.

Such protocols, the CEZA chief said, shows  that CEZA "remains steadfast in its commitment to provide sound regulatory framework anchored on fairness, honesty, transparency, integrity, and responsible conduct of interactive gaming to enhance integrity of the industry and provide protection to the players, investors, and most especially to the local community."

"CEZA continues to improve its regulations with new technologies to help enhance compliance. In fact, we have been working very closely with the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC). CEZA is one of the agencies that has been able and has managed to comply with the requirements early on because we are closely monitoring and educating all our locators regarding AMLC rules,” she added. —RF, GMA Integrated News