Senator Win Gatchalian urged the Bureau of Immigration to "proactively confiscate" the alien certificate of registration cards (ACRs) issued to all foreigners employed in Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) who were guilty of doing criminal activities in the country.

Gatchalian lamented these POGO workers, particularly those engaged in illegal activities, have been recycling the use of such ACRs to justify their continued stay in the Philippines and give them a semblance of validity.

“I strongly suggest that the physical cards should be confiscated because, in our country, physical cards matter,” he said. 

“Once you show the physical card, there's an immediate assumption of legitimacy, but we are dealing with criminals, including human trafficking syndicates that were apprehended, and yet they are carrying valid IDs. It's better to confiscate these IDs so they won't be able to use the IDs,” he added. 

Gatchalian said the government has no way to check the validity of the information put in the ID as concerned agencies are not even interconnected.

“This absence of connectivity enables holders of government-issued IDs to lend credibility to the information specified in those IDs,” he noted. 

It was revealed during a public hearing, conducted by the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee earlier this week, that foreign nationals are rampantly involved in the unauthorized proliferation and use of government documents in the Philippines so they can freely exhibit illegal activities, such as human trafficking, scamming, among others.

In October last year, law enforcement raided Smart Web Technology, a POGO establishment in Pasay City.

Gatchalian cited some of the foreign workers in the raided hub were employed under a registered Brickhartz Technology Inc.—a POGO service provider implicated in a kidnapping and human trafficking case. 

Some workers, with legitimate ACRs, were also linked to the SA Rivendell Global Support, Inc., another POGO-accredited service provider, previously raided in August 2023 for similar illegal activities. 

“This is alarming because this indicates that government-issued IDs are being recycled to perpetrate illegal activities,” Gatchalian said.

He then reiterated his call for the government to expel POGOs from the Philippines.

“The social costs of allowing them to continue operations in the country far outweigh any economic benefit derived from the industry,” Gatchalian said.