ILOILO City – Without a written order from its central office, the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) Iloilo won’t give a go-signal to two Small Town Lottery (STL) franchisees in this city and Iloilo province to resume their operation.
“We will wait for the written memo bag-o ako mag-announce. As of now, there is none,” said Jeanette Lloyd, branch manager of PCSO Iloilo.
On Thursday night, PCSO general manager Royina Garma announced that President Rodrigo Duterte had lifted the suspension order on STL.
PCSO’s STL franchisee in this city is the ZFIC Gaming Corp. For Iloilo province, it is the Red Subay Gaming Corp.
According to Lloyd, these franchisees won’t resume their operation until they have received an order from her office.
Duterte suspended the PCSO games STL, lotto, Keno, and Perhayan ng Bayan on July 26 due to alleged “massive corruption” in the agency and some authorized agent corporations or franchisees. He ordered an investigation.
Five days after, he allowed the resumption of lotto games.
“We are happy to announce that…the President lifted the suspension of operation of STL. All authorized agent corporations (AACs) that are compliant with the conditions of their STL agency agreement and have been remitting their guaranteed minimum monthly retail receipts (may resume operation) provided conditions are met,” Garma said in a statement.
Over 300 agents or bet collectors of STL in this city and at least a thousand subagents were displaced by the game’s suspension.
“They were really hard up,” said Daryl Alibusa, operations manager of ZFIC Gaming Corp.
Garma said the conditions that the AACs must meet are as follows:
* The AACs shall deposit to the PCSO a cash bond equivalent to three months of the PCSO’s share in the guaranteed monthly retail receipts (GMRR) on top of their existing cash bonds.
* Upon failure to timely and fully remit their GMMRR during the duration of operations, the AAC’s cash bond equivalent to three months of the PCSO’s share in the GMMRR shall be automatically forfeited in favor of PCSO, without prejudice to the other remedies that may be exercised by the government.
* Each AAC shall execute a written undertaking that it shall comply with its obligations under the STL agency agreement and will not institute any claims, monetary or otherwise, against the government and or apply for a temporary restraining order or injunction from any court to prevent the government from exercising its rights and prerogatives.
* The STL agency agreement shall automatically be terminated upon violation of the conditions of their franchise and or any of the above conditions without prejudice to the other remedies that may be exercised by the government./PN
