Revilla offers reward for info on Cebu CD piracy syndicate

CEBU CITY — Videogram Regulatory Board (VRB) chairman Ramon "Bong" Revilla Jr. said there is a syndicate operating in Cebu that owns a replicating machine churning out many of the pirated VCDs and audio CDs being peddled openly here.

The only problem, he said, is that the police are still trying to track the syndicate down.

Revilla, who was here to witness the destruction of confiscated pirated VCDs in front of City Hall Thursday afternoon, offered a cash reward of up to P500,000 to whoever could provide information leading to the confiscation of equipment for duplicating VCDs and CDs, and P1 million for equipment for duplicating DVDs.

Revilla, meanwhile, gave vendors of pirated VCDs a 10-day reprieve starting Friday in order for them to dispose of their remaining stocks.

Beyond the 10-day grace period, there will be an unrelenting drive against these vendors by law enforcers deputized by the VRB, according to Revilla, who was accompanied here by Danilo Olivares, president of the Philippine Association of the Recording Industry.

The Cebu United Muslim Traders Association, whose members are mostly selling pirated VCDs, had asked for one month within which to dispose of their stocks, but Revilla said a 10-day reprieve is enough.

"After 10 days, i-surrender ninyo kay mayor ang remaining stocks," Revilla told the traders in a dialogue which Mayor Tomas Osmeña also attended.

Revilla learned from Osmeña that the traders had been given a number of extensions since September last year so that no more concessions should be given them.

Sultan Ayaon Naif Punut, president of the Muslim traders’ association, insisted though that the 10-day reprieve is not enough to totally dispose of their stocks of VCDs. — Freeman News Service