Philippine Senator Demands Lottery Suspension over Rigged Drawings

^{Photo: Philippine Senator Imee R. Marcos}

Philippine Senator Imee Marcos has slammed the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO), the state lottery, for fixing the results of the drawings and has called for a halt to its operations.

In an interview with reporters, Marcos said that the PCSO lotteries had such frequent payouts that the odds were against them.

The senator said that PCSO should stop the traditional and online drawings until it can explain what’s going on.

Marcos is not alone in her suspicions. Last week, the Senate Committee on Games and Amusement started an investigation into the frequent jackpots in PCSO. In December 2023 alone, 11 drawings gave out a total of 2.4 billion Philippine pesos ($42.5 million).

The details of the investigation are still under wraps, but after the senator’s interview, PCSO and Marcos traded barbs.

The lottery’s general manager, Mel Robles, tried to convince Marcos that PCSO doesn’t have the ability to tamper with the outcomes. But the senator was not buying it.

It’s worth noting that the lottery also had to answer to the Senate for another reason recently: the organizers did a poor job of editing a photo with the jackpot winner. PCSO said that they altered the photo to keep the winner’s identity secret and admitted that the photoshop was a failure.

Bad photoshop of a photo with the PCSO lottery winner