On Monday, the Division of Justice (DOJ) filed a movement to cancel the passport of former presidential spokesperson Harry Roque, who has fled the nation after being linked to unlawful Philippine offshore gaming operators (Pogos). Claiming authorities persecution, Roque is looking for political asylum within the Netherlands.
Canceling his passport will make him an undocumented alien topic to deportation, DOJ Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla stated of Roque, now the topic of an arrest warrant not too long ago issued by a Pampanga courtroom for certified human trafficking, a nonbailable offense. The federal government can even search Interpol help and use diplomatic channels to convey Roque again to face the courtroom, Remulla added.
For months, Roque had ignored authorities summons for him to cooperate with a Home probe on his hyperlinks to a Pogo hub in Porac, Pampanga, discovered to be internet hosting felony actions. Requested about his suspiciously inflated property within the listening to, Roque had promised to point out the Home prosecution panel paperwork proving the legality of his sudden wealth. As an alternative, he slipped overseas and surfaced within the Netherlands in March.
Though he has denied it, Roque was listed because the authorized officer of Fortunate South 99 in paperwork discovered on the property throughout a authorities raid in June 2024, following allegations of torture, human trafficking, and scamming actions.
A entrance for scams
An earlier raid on one other Pogo facility in Bamban, Tarlac, yielded proof of comparable rip-off operations, whereas subsequent Home hearings on Pogos in Could 2024 uncovered using falsified beginning certificates to faux Filipino citizenship, in addition to potential spying actions by at least former Bamban, Tarlac mayor Alice Guo. Guo managed to flee however was captured in Indonesia in September final 12 months. She is now being held in a Pasig jail on scores of cash laundering circumstances.
Regardless of avowals of distaste for on-line playing, former president Rodrigo Duterte allowed Pogo hubs to flourish, citing elevated authorities revenues. In 2020, he urged Congress to cross a regulation legalizing and regulating Pogos amid complaints that they had been getting used as a entrance for scams, cash laundering, pressured labor, and kidnapping for ransom. In July final 12 months, President Marcos issued a ban on Pogos, and set their full withdrawal from the nation by finish of 2024.
That ought to have been the cue for regulation enforcement businesses to behave swiftly to file fees in opposition to high personalities concerned within the now unlawful commerce. The marketing campaign to deport or expel overseas nationals working within the shuttered Pogo hubs ought to have been left to the Bureau of Immigration (BI), to permit police and felony detection businesses to construct up strong circumstances in opposition to Pogo principals.
Backdoor exit
For the longest time, Roque had mocked the Marcos authorities for its unsuccessful makes an attempt to tug him again into the nation for Home hearings. Roque had been making noises that every one authorities strikes in opposition to him will show that he’s being persecuted and that it will strengthen his software for asylum.
“Flight is a sign of guilt,” Remulla has stated of Roque, a fugitive who might quickly be below a pink discover from the Interpol. With the Netherlands among the many nations that contemplate human trafficking a serious crime, Roque’s asylum prospects appear nil, Remulla added.
With the lengthy arm of the regulation extending abroad to claw again Roque, the justice official has commendably finished some home cleansing on the native entrance as nicely. He has questioned the Division of International Affairs (DFA) on gathered info that Roque has two or three passports that allowed him to go away the nation with out setting off alarms. Did DFA and BI insiders facilitate this anomalous course of? It’s unhealthy sufficient that felons and criminals have been identified to make use of the nation’s backdoor exit and porous borders with impunity, however being aided by authorities insiders make it worse.
Influential fugitives
The Felony Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) and the Nationwide Bureau of Investigation ought to be as thorough in going after those that had contributed to creating Pogos and their principals a scourge, together with the civil registrars in a number of Mindanao provinces stated to have issued faux beginning certificates to overseas nationals.
The arrest final week of a Roque coaccused within the certified human trafficking case—“the primary of the 51,” based on CIDG chief Police Maj. Gen. Nicolas Torre III, is encouraging. All of them, Roque included, have to be made to face fees to exhibit the federal government’s seriousness in rooting out the felony actions caused by the Pogo business.
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On Wednesday, it was reported that Arnolfo Teves Jr., who’s dealing with homicide fees for the killing of a political opponent, was arrested in Timor-Leste the place he fled to hunt asylum. That is one other constructive growth in efforts to convey again influential fugitives who’ve flouted our legal guidelines and made a mockery of our justice system. Will Roque be subsequent?
