CCPO: Drive versus gambling effective

CEBU, Philippines — The Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) has ended 2019 with fewer arrested persons in their intensified operations and information drive against illegal gambling, according to its information officer, Police Lieutenant Colonel Arriola.

Compared to 2018’s operations when the CCPO has arrested 2,622 individuals involved in anti-illegal gambling activities, this year, however, resulted to just 1,887 arrested persons.

Of the 2,622 persons arrested last year, 1,304 of them were arrested in police operations.  This year, they were able to accost 831 people due to illegal gambling.

Last year, the authorities were able to arrest 47 people with warrants of arrest, while this year they were able to serve warrants to 29 arrested persons.

The CCPO operatives had conducted at least 926 ant-illegal gambling operations this year, compared to 2018’s 1,329 operations.  They had operations though that were unsuccessful.  This year had 95 instances where the police operation yielded negative results, while there were 25 operations last year that were unproductive.

The CCPO was also able to file 802 cases that involve illegal gambling this year, which is lesser from the 1,257 cases filed last year.

In terms of pieces of evidence, the local police force had recovered at least P133,000 bet money this year, compared to last year’s P235,000.

Arriola said their series of information dissemination and campaign appeared to be effective, considering the decrease in the number of arrested persons.

He added that based on their operations, the people now know the difference between the illegal outlets and the authorized ones.

“So gipahibaw nato ang mga tawo unsay illegal nya makakita sila nga ang illegal gihimuan ug aksyon sa mga law enforcement agencies.  Dako na sya nga factor nga ang mga katawhan ron is dili na sila mo-patronize sa mga illegal activities, adto na gyud sila sa legal.  So, usa pud na siya nga sa naka-contribute nganong nigamay atoang illegal gambling,” Arriola said.

However, Arriola made sure that, even with the decreased cases of illegal gambling, they will continue to intensify their campaign against this next year. (FREEMAN)