AN ALLEGED Pogo hub was raided inside a hotel in Barangay Agus, Lapu-Lapu City, by the joint forces from the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC), National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT), and the Bureau of Immigration (BI) on Saturday, August 31.
The operatives broke into a one-story portion of the building and discovered more than a hundred individuals, who were reportedly involved in various scams.
Most of the people were Chinese nationals, but there were also some Indonesians, and some from Myanmar.
According to NBI 7 Director Renan Oliva, the rescued Chinese nationals are currently undergoing profiling.
Computers, believed to be used in love scams and other internet-based scams, were seized from the hotel, which was reportedly being used as a hub for illegal activities.
Oliva said the Lapu-Lapu City Prosecutor's Office was investigating the case of three Indonesian nationals who had escaped and filed a complaint against their employers on July 21, 2024, after they were briefly detained illegally.
As a result, the Indonesian embassy requested a rescue operation for their citizens
NBI 7 and other government agencies conducted a surveillance to confirm the statements made by the three Indonesian nationals during the inquiry that they were between 40 and 60 victims of various nationalities.
After confirming that there were indeed violations of Philippine immigration laws, the NBI 7 coordinated with PAOCC, DSWD, and BI to launch a rescue operation.
However, they were surprised upon entering the hotel to find numerous computers running love scams, operated by Chinese, Indonesian, and Myanmar nationals.
"Initially, the primary concern was a violation of immigration laws, but we discovered that they were involved in scams, so we are processing each of the foreigners identity, including those rescued," said Oliva.
Among those rescued were Filipino women, one of whom is a minor who was turned over to the DSWD 7 for processing and profiling.
Oliva added that those engaged in POGO operations in Pampanga, who had earlier been raided without being charged, had moved to Cebu in order to continue their fraudulent schemes.
They occupied three floors of the hotel, with bars and restaurants on the lower floor to keep the workers from leaving the premises.
As of this writing, the NBI and PAOCC agents were still searching the building.
Documents such as passports were being collected from the foreigners to determine whether any of them entered the country illegally.
Winston Casio, the PAOCC spokesperson, revealed that after receiving information from the central government regarding complaints from the Indonesian government, they immediately planned the rescue operation in coordination with the Department of Justice.
"We are here to rescue the Indonesian nationals, but upon arrival, we caught them inflagrante delicto, in the act of running scam operations. We found three scam farms run by Chinese, Indonesian, and Myanmar nationals," said Casio.
He explained that the activity that they discovered was a Philippine Offshore Gaming Operator (POGO). (AYB, TPT)