The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office on Monday appealed to lawmakers to further toughen laws against illegal lottery firms proliferating in the country.
This comes as PCSO general manager Mel Robles led the filing of charges at Mandaluyong Prosecutors Office against individuals behind the four firms engaged in the unauthorized online lottery operations.
"I am calling out the attention of the lawmakers to toughen the law. Maybe others see that they can handle the penalty but we'll see. Even if it's light, we will still pursue the cases against them," Robles said.
He added that the PCSO is losing billions of pesos in revenues because of the illegal operations perpetrated by the suspects.
"We are serious about this. We will prosecute and imprison everyone associated wit this illegal operation to stop them," Robles said.
The PCSO stated that a payment platform company, PayMaya, reported that they have remitted about 4.7 billion to a company operating illegal online lottery.
"A payment platform, like PayMaya, reported that they were able to remit about P4.7 billion to a company that was operating the Illegal lotto. It is also included in the complaint affidavit," Robles said.