Senator seeks crackdown on passport syndicates

SEN. Loren Legarda said authorities should intensify the campaign against syndicates selling Philippine passports and birth certificates to foreigners.

The senator made the call following the discovery that dismissed Bamban, Tarlac mayor Alice Guo is Chinese under the name Guo Hua Ping but managed to obtain a Philippine birth certificate through late registration.

Guo and her siblings Shiela and Wesley fled the country in July at the height of the Senate probe on their alleged involvement in illegal Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs) in Tarlac. Alice and Shiela were arrested weeks apart in Indonesia.

Sen. Loren Legarda. (Adrian Luciano, Senate Social Media Unit / Joseph B. Vidal, OSP)

Legarda asked Guo who gave her a Philippine passport and birth certificate.

«Tell us how you became Filipino. If you answer us properly, then we can help you. But if you keep lying, you will sink into the web of lies, and we won't be able to protect you,» Legarda said.

Despite evidence from the National Bureau of Investigation, including fingerprints, the dismissed mayor denied she and Guo Hua Ping are the same person.

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The Senate Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality cited Guo for contempt for her persistent denial.

With over a thousand cases of fraudulent birth certificates confirmed by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), including Guo's case, Legarda cautioned that government agencies, including the PSA and the Department of Foreign Affairs, might have been infiltrated by syndicates, hence, compromising national security.

«What we needed to know is to determine which agencies in government or fixers helped her to obtain a birth certificate and passport,» Legarda said.