Hontiveros: Hundreds of foreigners duped into working in Manila 'scam hubs'
MANILA, Philippines — Sen. Risa Hontiveros on Wednesday claimed that the Philippines, which has long been working to eliminate human trafficking, is now home to scam hubs where foreign nationals have been duped into working by their compatriots.
In a hearing led by the Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality, Hontiveros said that "large condominium buildings are being repurposed to be used as living and working facilities for trafficked human beings being forced to perform scams on hapless victims."
She said the trafficking victims, in the hundreds to the thousands, are reportedly from Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia and Myanmar as well as from countries in South Asia and Africa.
During the hearing, Hontiveros presented Indonesian national "Ridwan", who shared his experience.
He told the panel he saw a job for digital marketing posted on Facebook in late February, but upon arrival in the Philippines, he was told to engage in a scam targeting his fellow Indonesians.
Ridwan said that he and two other Indonesians arrived at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport on March 7. He said a person wearing navy pants, white shirt and an apple green vest met them.
The person escorted them for seamless passage through the Bureau of Quarantine and the Bureau of Immigration counters.
Ridwan said a driver brought them to Bayport West NAIA Garden Residences in Pasay City where they stayed in Tower 5 as their sleeping quarter, and were brought to the tower next to it for work.
"We were instructed to steal the identities of other people to scam targets. Our targets are our fellow Indonesians. We find them on Tinder, Facebook, and Instagram. After our targets fall in love with us, we make them invest in cryptocurrency. When we do not get victims, we will get punished," he told the panel.
Ridwan said they were told they will receive a salary of P80,000 a month, but some employees were begging him for instant noodles and cigarettes. He added that there were also secret areas where trafficking victims were electrocuted.
Upon learning this, Ridwan said he lied and said he was sick and could not do the job anymore. He was however told that he had to pay back what the company spent for him. He said he gave them P100,000.
Ridwan left the Philippines on March 16.
Foot-dragging?
Sen. Raffy Tulfo, who joined the panel's hearing, asked Manila International Airport Authority chief Cesar Chiong for a copy of the CCTV footage of Ridwan’s arrival.
Chiong however said they no longer have a copy of it because they received the request from Hontiveros’ office just this week and they only store footage for 30 days.
This prompted Tulfo to push the MIAA to improve their storage capability, stressing that this is already an emergency situation — which Chiong promised to look into.
Ridwan also shared that he surmised there are 1,000 people, from China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines and from countries in Africa working in the tower.
Asked if the others would want to be rescued, Ridwan said "yes" and explained that the other workers were too scared to leave. "It’s very dangerous, maybe they will kill us if we try to go outside," he said.
This should have already rung the alarm bells at agencies like the National Bureau of Investigation and the Inter-Agency Council for Anti-Trafficking, the senators pressed.
Justice Undersecretary Nicholas Felix Ty, representing the IACAT, admitted that they may have failed to flag this situation as their focus had been online sexual exploitation of children.
But Ty said the IACAT would cover this in their investigation.
NBI Anti-Human Trafficking Division chief Catherine Nolasco said they only received the information on Monday, but that they had already sent agents to check the area.
Tulfo, who was increasingly frustrated during the hearing, pressed the NBI that after they read Ridwan’s testimony and confirmed that thousands of foreigners were residing in the condominium towers, they should have already raised alarms.
"You could have called the [Bureau of] Immigration, IACAT, [Philippine National Police] so you can discuss that there are many foreigners in the building," Tulfo said.
Hontiveros said she shares Tulfo’s frustration and noted that there seems to be "foot-dragging in inbound trafficking and cryptoscamming."
Nolasco said their investigation is ongoing and they are targeting to secure a search warrant to be authorized to conduct a raid.
The hearing is still ongoing as of this post.
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