Efforts to locate 31 missing ‘sabungeros’ to continue: Sotto

MANILA – Senate President and vice presidential candidate Vicente “Tito” Sotto III said government efforts to locate the 31 missing “sabungeros” (cockfighting enthusiasts) will continue after President Rodrigo R. Duterte agreed to suspend the licenses of seven online cockfighting (e-sabong) firms that might be connected to the case.

Speaking at a public forum at the St. Anne College Lucena, Inc. in Quezon on Monday, Sotto said the Senate will exhaust all possible means until they get to the bottom of the issue.

“Nakita niyo ‘yung sama ng takbo ng (kaso), ano, malupit e. ‘Yung mga taong nasa likod niyan, malupit. (You saw how bad this [case] has been running—it’s tough. The people behind this [abduction] are cruel),” Sotto said.

Based on what they gathered during their first hearing on the matter last February 24, Sotto said there might be more than 31 individuals that need to be accounted for, including a driver and a 14-year-old sibling of one of the victims who also disappeared.

“Ang bilang sa ngayon 31 ‘yung nawawala pero ang sabi sa amin ng PNP (Philippine National Police) baka mas malaki pa raw kaysa sa 31 ‘yung nawawala. Ngayon, ang hearing magkakaroon ulit sa Biyernes (The number of those who were reported missing is 31 at the moment, but we are told by the PNP (Philippine National Police) there might be more than 31 who are missing. Now, we will have another hearing for it this Friday),” the vice presidential aspirant said.

Sotto already filed a resolution for the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pagcor)to suspend the licenses of seven e-sabong firms that are involved in the case, which Partido Reporma presidential candidate and fellow Senator Ping Lacson seconded.

Senator Ronald ‘Bato’ dela Rosa, chair of the Senate Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs, which has been leading the investigation on the abduction case said Pagcor has referred it to Duterte, who agreed to cancel the operations of the implicated e-sabong firms.

“Kaya by Friday, tiyak na suspendido lahat, ‘yung may lisensya ng pito (So by Friday, all these seven firms will have their license suspended),” Sotto said, quoting dela Rosa.

Meanwhile, Partido Reporma senatorial candidate and former PNP chief Guillermo Eleazar, who joined the Lacson-Sotto team during their campaign sortie in his home province, welcomed these developments.

He also called for the strengthening of the PNP to intensify its efforts towards solving crimes.

“Sa pangyayaring ito, dapat ma-solve ang mga kaso, lalo na itong pagkawala nitong 31 na mga sinasabi nating sabungero. Kaya nga po para sa akin and we have experienced (it), nakita natin sa PNP, we can only do so much (In events like this, we need to solve the case, especially in regards to the abduction of the 31 online cockfight enthusiasts. And so, to me, we have experienced it, we saw that in the PNP, we can only do so much),” Eleazar said.

These developments call for the enhancement of the PNP with state-of-the-art technology, he added.

For instance, Eleazar floated the possibility of installing an interconnected closed-circuit television (CCTV) system that police officers can monitor thoroughly, which he said could accelerate the progress of crime scene investigations in the country.