WHEN the Senate resumes hearings today regarding dismissed Bamban, Tarlac mayor Alice Guo, many will be on tenterhooks again as they follow the gripping saga of the erstwhile elected local executive.
One interesting question will be whether the 34-year-old businesswoman and politician, who served as mayor from June 30, 2022 to Aug. 13, 2024, will disclose more information on people behind the proliferation of illegal Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) here.
That kind of information may prosper only in an executive session where the public would be excluded and the contents of the discussion are treated as confidential.
At least three senators last week rejected Guo’s appeal for an executive session, with Senator Risa Hontiveros – who leads the Senate probe – saying Guo must tel the public the truth before a closed session is granted.
We hope Guo will attend the Senate hearing today, which will be her second since her arrest in Indonesia on Sept. 4, two days before her deportation.
The Senate issued an arrest warrant against her on July 13 for repeatedly failing to attend its investigation into the raided POGO hub in Bamban – with documents suggesting she fled the Philippines five days later.
Senate Deputy Majority Leader Joseph Victor Ejercito favors an executive session, and is keen on knowing who helped Guo run for office which would point to how supposed Chinese nationals were able to run for elective posts in different areas and whether Guo is a spy, denied by her in previous hearings.
Then there is Senator Joel Villanueva believing the “big boss” of illegal POGOs is one Duanren Wu, an alleged former Chinese cop and an incorporator of the Whirlwind Corp., which leased the property in Porac, Pampanga where the Lucky South 99 compound is.
Villanueva made the statement a day after an official of the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission named Huang Zhiyang as the illegal POGOS’ “boss of all bosses.”
Huang, one of the co-incorporators of Alice Guo in Baofu Land Development, which leased the land to the raided POGO firm in Bamban, is reported to be a Chinese fugitive found with five passports in a raid in Clark Freeport Zone, Pampanga.
She is also slapped with 87 counts of money laundering, apart from qualified human trafficking complaint connected to the POGO raid.
Last week, Justice Undersecretary Nicky Ty told a news conference that under the law, individuals who organize an establishment engaged in human trafficking may be held accountable for human trafficking.
The defense of Guo’s camp and other respondents is they did not recruit, did not harm, did not torture, nor commit any other human trafficking offenses against the victims.
While the episode gets deeper with all the developments, we hope justice and accountability will be achieved before too long.
