The House quad committee yesterday urged the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) to file forfeiture cases against Chinese nationals who have allegedly been using their fraudulent Filipino citizenships to illegally acquire land and operate businesses in the Philippines, including offshore gaming hubs.
Surigao del Sur Rep. Robert Ace Barbers, chairman of the joint panel, said in a press conference that they have turned over to the OSG documents they have gathered during its investigation into the criminal activities of Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) and the continued proliferation of illegal drugs under the Duterte administration.
He said the documents were received by Assistant Solicitor Generals Hermes Ocampo and Gilbert Medrano and Senior State Solicitor General Neil Lorenzo at the House of Representatives.
“In the course of the investigation of the Committee on Public Accounts and the Committee on Dangerous Drugs, we have discovered that there are several Chinese personalities who acquired thousands of hectares of land in the province of Pampanga,” Barbers said.
Lawmakers particularly want the OSG to sue Aedy Tai Yang, a Chinese citizen suspected of falsifying documents to obtain Filipino citizenship, which he allegedly used to skirt foreign ownership laws and enabled him to acquire land and set up businesses illegally.
Barbers also cited the case of suspected Chinese drug lord “Willie Ong,” whose real identity is believed to be Cai Qimeng, the owner of Empire 999, which owns the warehouse in Mexico, Pampanga where a shabu shipment worth P3.6 billion was seized in 2023.
Lawmakers have discovered that Yang is also an incorporator of Empire 999.
Barbers said Ong has as many as 300 land titles under his name even if the Constitution prohibits foreigners from owning lands and limits business ownership of foreigners to 40 percent.
Among the documents submitted to the OSG are Yang’s Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA)-issued birth certificate from 2004, despite his claim of being born in 1983.
Records from the Municipal Civil Registry of San Antonio, Nueva Ecija, indicated that his birth documents were supposedly destroyed in a fire, casting doubts on the legitimacy of his citizenship claim.
Other evidence includes certifications from the PSA on Yang’s marriage, tax declarations for properties in his name, and corporate records linked to him, such as those from Empire 999 Realty Corporation and Sunflare Industrial Supply Corp.
These companies are tied to suspicious land acquisitions, with records from the Land Registration Authority (LRA) revealing properties owned by Empire 999’s incorporators.
The questionable property acquisitions of Chinese citizens in the country came to light because of the extensive investigation being held since last year by the Barbers panel into the shabu seized in the municipality of Mexico which came from the Port of Subic.
This probe was what led to separate inquiries by the Committee on Public Accounts into properties acquired with the alleged connivance of local government units, implicating former Mexico Mayor Teddy Tumang and Mayor Abundio Punsalan Jr. of San Simon, both in the province of Pampanga.
The investigation revealed that numerous hectares of land were being bought by corporations with incorporators who were Chinese nationals.
The Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) has confirmed that some of the lands sold by Yang did not undergo the required conversion process, highlighting the illegal nature of the transactions.
“These actions are blatant violations of our laws and call for immediate executive intervention,” the joint committee said in a letter to Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra.
In the letter, Barbers and the three other chairmen of the four panels comprising the quad committee – Reps. Dan Fernandez of Sta. Rosa City, Bienvenido Abante Jr. of Manila and Joseph Stephen Paduano (PL, Abang Lingkod) — called on the OSG to expedite its review of the documents they have forwarded and initiate civil forfeiture proceedings, in coordination with other government agencies, against the Chinese nationals.
It said the OSG should work with agencies such as the LRA, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), PSA, DAR, Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), and the Department of Justice (DOJ) to ensure a thorough investigation and legal enforcement.
“We trust your office will prioritize this matter and act swiftly to protect the integrity of our nation’s legal and economic systems,” it urged Guevarra.
DOWNGRADED VISAS
Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla yesterday said many foreign POGO workers failed to meet the October 15 deadline for them to voluntarily downgrade their visas.
Visa downgrading allows foreign nationals to revert their status from a work visa to a temporary visitor visa, which would enable them to remain legally in the Philippines for 59 days while winding down their affairs.
“We’re automatically downgrading them already. Which means that they are not anymore allowed to conduct activities, except for winding down,” Remulla told reporters in an ambush interview.
“Winding down is very important since the business entails taking money from people into a wallet, an e-wallet that contains their betting capital. It has to be returned to the owners and that is the most important part of the winding down,” he said.
He said more than 5,000 foreign POGO workers failed to comply with the October 15 deadline.
“They will be considered as illegal aliens after December 31, 2024,” he said, referring to the deadline set by Malacañang to shut down the operation of offshore gaming firms in the country.
Remulla said those who failed or refused to downgrade their visas are no longer allowed to work.
“They can only work in the winding down of their companies. But to actively play a role in getting bets or conducting the business, nobody is allowed to do that anymore. Probably, the Filipinos who are there might still be able to do it, but the foreigners are supposed to wind down already,” he also said.
Remulla said the Bureau of Immigration would conduct “fugitive recovery operations” against foreign POGO workers who failed or declined to downgrade their visas.
“It can happen because the numbers are not satisfactory as of now. And there are many people who have not voluntarily downgraded their visas. It shows that many of them really don’t want to leave the country,” he said.
Last week, the BI said more than 12,000 foreign POGO workers have already downgraded their visas.
It said that majority of those who applied for voluntary downgrading were Chinese nationals.
Among those who downgraded their visas where the 17 Chinese nationals apprehended by authorities for allegedly operating a scam hub in Makati City recently.
Immigration Commissioner Joel Anthony Viado said BI procedures have already been simplified to ensure compliance, adding that those who fail to downgrade by the deadline or leave the country by December 31 will face deportation and blacklisting to prevent their reentry to the country.
ESPIONAGE
Cagayan De Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez yesterday filed two bills seeking to amend the country’s anti-espionage laws by penalizing the act even during peace time.
Rodriguez filed the measures amid allegations that dismissed Bamban, Tarlac mayor Alice Guo is a Chinese spy and in the face of concerns that there are Chinese and other foreign spies lurking in national government offices, local government units, the diplomatic community, and even in the private sector.
Rodriguez also said the anti-espionage law has to be amended in the wake of the worsening conflict in the West Philippine Sea, especially since Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. has already asked Congress to amend it since the law is only applicable during wartime.
“What is important now is that we penalize espionage during times of peace because the espionage law in the Philippines is only effective during times of war. This is also a call to action to our lawmakers to amend the espionage law so that the government can properly respond and address this issue,” he said.
In his explanatory notes in House Bill Nos. 10983 and 10988, Rodriguez said the present laws on espionage are Commonwealth Act No. 616, entitled, “An Act to punish espionage and other offenses against national security,” enacted in 1941; and the Revised Penal Code, which took effect in 1932.
“There is a need to review these laws and amend the same to make them adapt to the situation in light of evolving global security threats, technological advancements and the changing nature of espionage activities,” he said.
He said the country “faces numerous threats from foreign intelligence services, terrorist organizations and cybercriminals.”
He added that his bills seek “to address these concerns by amending and augmenting current legal provisions to provide comprehensive protection against espionage and related offenses.”
“By enhancing penalties and updating definitions to align with contemporary security challenges, the legislation aims to bolster the Philippines’ ability to preserve and protect its national security interests,” Rodriguez said.
HBN 10983 seeks to amend Article 117 of the Revised Penal Code to prohibit espionage “in times of peace or in times of war.”
The penalty of prison correctional (six months and one day to six years) would be imposed on any person who, (1) “without authority therefor, enters a warship, fort, or naval or military establishment or reservation to obtain any information, plans, photographs, or other data of a confidential nature relative to the defense of the Philippine archipelago,” or; (2) “being in possession, by reason of the public office he holds, of the articles, data, or information referred to in the preceding paragraph, discloses their contents to a representative of a foreign nation.”
The next higher penalty would be imposed if the offender is a public officer or employee.
HBN 10988, on the other hand, would expand the “coverage of espionage, amending for the purpose Commonwealth Act No. 616… and providing higher penalties for violations thereof.”
The proposed heavier penalties for various acts of espionage in peacetime and wartime include life imprisonment and a fine of not less than P2 million, life imprisonment or a fine of not less than P1 million or both, imprisonment of not more than 30 years or a fine of not less than P500,000 or both, and a jail term of 10 years to 12 years or a fine of not less than P500,000 or both. — With Ashzel Hachero
