IF AN investigation will be conducted on the operation of all numbers games in the country, Manapla is ready to submit a report on how the Small Town Lottery's (STL) operations helped improve the delivery of basic services in the town.
Thus said Manuel Escalante, former Manapla mayor and presently an executive assistant to Governor Alfredo Marañon Jr., adding that Manapla's Municipal Planning and Development Office under Honey Fanuga had documented how STL's operations had contributed towards the enhancement of Manapla's health and education programs.
Five percent of STL revenues go to agent-corporations, another five percent goes to taxes, while the remaining 90 percent is allotted to prizes, charity funds and operating funds.
Thirty percent of the proceeds go to charity. Ten percent of charity funds go to the host city or municipality, 5 percent to the Provincial Government, 2.5 percent to the congressional district, 5 percent to the Philippine National Police, and 7.5 percent to the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office.
Escalante said that, when he was still Manapla mayor, the municipality used the town's share from STL for the health and education programs of the town.
Moreover, he added STL operations practically eradicated the illegal "daily double" numbers game, which had been in existence since he was still a small boy.
Escalante said that the documentation to this effect had been readied and that Manapla's MPDO is ready to submit it to the Department of Interior and Local Government, in case an investigation will be conducted about the operation of STL.
The reported investigation of all numbers games operations came out in the wake of charges that STL is reportedly used in several areas in Luzon as a front for the operation of other illegal numbers games.
According to a report by the PCSO, the STL operations generated more than P3 billion in revenues and created about 62,500 jobs that benefited displaced jueteng workers in its first year of operation. (TED)