Pampanga mayor: I got P200,000 jueteng payola in a month

APALIT, Pampanga — Mayor Tirso Lacanilao publicly admitted yesterday that he received between P150,000 and P200,000 in monthly jueteng payoff before the government cracked down on the illegal numbers game here.

Speaking over local radio station dwRW-FM, Lacanilao accused other Pampanga mayors of "hypocrisy" after they issued a resolution recently backing the campaign against jueteng.

"A mayor receives a monthly salary of only P22,000," he said.

"That is certainly not enough for people who ask us every day to help them with the tuition fees for their children, for their hospital bills, for contributions for the dead, for basketball tournaments, for Holy Week ‘pabasa,’" he added.

During an interview with The STAR, Lacanilao repeated the same statements, admitting getting payoffs from jueteng, and that he would stand by what he said even if it meant going to jail.

However, Lacanilao refused to identify the source of the money. "The cash is delivered to me, but I don’t know from whom," he said.

Lacanilao said the jueteng crackdown had deprived some 600 families in Apalit of their only source of livelihood.

"They come to me for financial help, but I cannot give them any because the source of money for helping them is not there anymore," he said.

Many of the now jobless jueteng cobradores have no other skills to seek other jobs because few have completed even elementary school, he added.

Lacanilao said he did not attend the meeting between the Pampanga Mayors League and President Arroyo at the "White House" in Clark Special Economic Zone on Thursday because he did not want to be a hypocrite.

"Sino ba sa kanila ang hindi mahilig mag-advance (Who among the mayors are not fond of asking for cash advances)?" he asked.

He was referring to reports that mayors receive advance payoffs from jueteng to cover their election campaign expenses.

While the issued tackled in the meeting were not disclosed to media, sources told The STAR Mrs. Arroyo discussed the jueteng issue.

The mayors reportedly submitted a resolution to Mrs. Arroyo "strongly supporting" her drive against jueteng nationwide.

Angeles City Mayor Carmelo Lazatin and Mabalacat, Pampanga Mayor Marino Morales were also reported to have presented to Mrs. Arroyo their proposal for the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office to hire jueteng bet collectors or cobradores for a legalized "Easy 2" numbers game.

Lacanilao said he would back a plan to legalize jueteng, an idea originally proposed by ousted President Joseph Estrada.

Once legalized, the popular numbers game would be placed in the hands of local governments, which could use the proceeds for much-needed projects.

"The local governments must be allowed to operate legalized jueteng autonomously," he said.

Under a legalized jueteng scheme, the raffle of winning numbers would be conducted in the presence of representatives of the religious sector, the Department of Education and a non-government organization to eliminate cheating, Lacanilao said.