Alice in POGOland

Graphics: Thea Garay

For a country that requires an ID to get an ID, Bamban Mayor Alice Guo’s stranger-than-fiction saga is truly mind-bending. While most of us struggle to get proof of our own identity, it appears that some persons with dubious backgrounds can invent theirs, make a profit, and exercise the rights and privileges of Filipino citizenship even that of being elected to public office.  

Despite the daring feat, it seems that for Mayor Guo, fortune does not always favor the bold. In a recent exposé, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) just confirmed that Mayor Alice Guo and the Chinese national named Guo Hua Ping who entered the Philippines last January 2003 are one and the same person after the fingerprints matched in a dactyloscopy examination. The NBI claimed that the science behind dactyloscopy is infallible, even identical twins do not share the same fingerprints. Senator Risa Hontiveros opined that the report is conclusive evidence that Guo is not a Filipino. Relatively, Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra called this finding a breakthrough that would help expedite the OSG’s quo warranto petition against the embattled local chief. 

We may recall that Guo’s strange case came into the spotlight during the hearing of the Senate panel on women chaired by Senator Hontiveros, then initially investigating controversies around Zun Yuan Technology Inc., a Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations (Pogo) firm based in Bamban, Tarlac amid accusation of kidnapping by an alleged former detainee. Her name was eventually dragged to Zun Yuan, successor of Hongsheng Gaming Technology Inc., which was raided last February 2023, and then again in March 2024, already under the name of the first-mentioned firm. Philippine authorities flagged the hub for its link to scam operations, human trafficking, and even cyber-attacks on government websites. 

Subsequently, Guo admitted to having helped Hongsheng secure municipal council approval to operate in Bamban before she entered politics. However, she denied ties with the Pogos and claimed that she merely filed the Letter of No Objection as an incorporator of Baofu Land Development, the developer of the 10-hectare Pogo compound where the firms are located housing 36 structures including barracks, villas, Olympic-size pool, and a secret tunnel that connects the villas. It can be noted that the Pogos flourished like mushrooms during former President Rodrigo Duterte’s China-kowtowing administration, rationalizing that the country needed its tax proceeds. 

However, the plot thickened when the Senate panel pressed Guo on her mysterious background. As if stricken by amnesia, Guo cannot seem to recall her past. Her narrative attempted to build her identity as a lovechild of her Chinese father and Filipina maid, left by the latter at her tender age; she grew up on their farm, homeschooled, with limited access to the outside world. Guo claimed to be a simple citizen, but this image was betrayed by the fact that she owned a helicopter, more than a dozen vehicles, and luxury items purchased in the final years of former President Duterte. In another revelation, Guo was also linked to two foreigners arrested in Singapore who were involved in an SG$ 3 billion money laundering case. 

Beyond the seemingly unending surprises unearthed about Guo’s identity, to her credit, she has truly learned to become a Filipino. She played a very familiar playbook, realizing that the best way to facilitate shady business is to enter politics and brush elbows with powerful politicians. Guo pulled the right strings and navigated the intricate web merging crimes and politics that since the past defined our country’s political arena like jueteng and narcopolitics. Guo spits on the face of our flawed democracy. Moreso, her gamble begs the question that if a person with a dubious background had enough confidence to run for public office despite knowing that she risks undue attention, what power and how many more lurks behind the shadows? Needless to say, authorities must examine this deeply as it may be just the tip of an iceberg. 

Strikingly, Guo’s saga came in a time of a volatile and complicated Philippines-China relationship, especially over the West Philippine Sea issue. The public speculates that Guo might be a Chinese asset and the Pogos are trojan horses of Chinese interference in our domestic affairs. Solons also raised alarm about the Pogos’ national security threat after what appears to be Chinese military uniforms and pins were found during a raid in another Pogo hub in Porac, Pampanga. Wandering Alice in the Pogoland made us realize the obvious – how vulnerable we are to foreign infiltration. 

Revelations after revelation, perhaps this drama has already reached its denouement. The problem is, in this spectacle-loving, intrigue-hungry, gossip-predilect culture of ours, issues are never really distilled; just as in the past, we often move from one controversy to another. National issues are only publicly followed if they have a soap opera value while we are silent on concerns of utmost importance despite affecting our very lives and freedoms if it lacks drama. This time, we can only hope that we will not be found lacking both attention and reflection, foresight and memory. Because often, after the coverage dies down, controversies park and guo. What remains is our dismissive cynicism; this is our brand of politics, this is our fate, and we succumb to a collective amnesia while the problem creeps down.