{"id":22125,"date":"2021-08-30T13:56:33","date_gmt":"2021-08-30T16:56:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=22125"},"modified":"2026-04-23T16:11:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T19:11:09","slug":"boracay-residents-and-businesses-reject-gambling-on-the-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/boracay-residents-and-businesses-reject-gambling-on-the-island","title":{"rendered":"Boracay residents and businesses reject gambling on the island"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte&#8217;s suggestion of allowing gambling in Boracay has been heavily criticised by residents and business owners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>The Philippines.- The possibility of<strong>\u00a0allowing gambling in Boracay<\/strong> has caused criticisms from local residents and business owners who say such a project has long been opposed on the island.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last week, the Philippine president,\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/galaxy-entertainment-could-resume-plans-for-boracay-casino\">Rodrigo Duterte<\/a>, rekindled the possibility of<strong>\u00a0allowing gambling in Boracay<\/strong>, noting that his country needs income to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Duterte said: \u201cWe don\u2019t have money now. Where we can get money, I will get it.\u00a0<strong>If it will be from gambling, so be it<\/strong>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to The Inquirer,\u00a0<strong>residents on Boracay<\/strong> <strong>believe the president should allow the development of casinos in other places<\/strong>\u00a0but not in Boracay. They want authorities to focus on increasing the vaccination rate on the island to allow the return of foreign visitors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In 2018, Galaxy Entertainment received a licence to\u00a0<strong>build a $500m IR on the island<\/strong>. It partnered with\u00a0<strong>Leisure &amp; Resorts World Corp.<\/strong>\u00a0(LRWC) and bought parcels of land to start building the IR, which the company described as a low-rise, eco-friendly project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However,&nbsp;<strong>Duterte closed the island destination to tourism&nbsp;<\/strong>out of concerns for the environment, saying that an increased number of visitors was turning Boracay into a \u201ccesspool.\u201d&nbsp;<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/boracay-casino-plans\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">LRWC<\/a>&nbsp;dropped its plans soon afterwards, leaving Galaxy Entertainment without a partner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Residents had already feared that the creation of the<strong>\u00a0<\/strong><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/new-boracay-development-authority-could-allow-casinos\">Boracay Island Development Authority<\/a>\u00a0as a government-owned and controlled corporation (GOCC) could lead casinos on the Philippine island.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Natividad Bernardino<\/strong>, chairman of the Boracay Inter-Agency Rehabilitation Management Group, said: \u201cThe problem of Boracay is one of over-tourism and overdevelopment.\u00a0What we need in terms of sustaining the rehabilitation and ecological sustainability of the island is\u00a0<strong>a regulatory body instead of a GOCC<\/strong>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She said\u00a0<strong>the island has already exceeded its carrying capacity\u00a0<\/strong>for the environment and population, and that there is no more space for further investment and development. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte&#8217;s suggestion of allowing gambling in Boracay has been heavily criticised by residents and business owners.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":19050,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has reignited discussions regarding the allowance of gambling in Boracay to bolster post-pandemic economic recovery, despite strong opposition from local residents and businesses citing environmental concerns and past development failures. This potential policy shift revives a 2018 initiative where Galaxy Entertainment and LRWC had planned an Integrated Resort (IR) before environmental closures halted the project.","focusai_entities":"Rodrigo Duterte, Galaxy Entertainment, Leisure & Resorts World Corp. (LRWC), Boracay Island Development Authority, Natividad Bernardino, Boracay Inter-Agency Rehabilitation Management Group","focusai_location":"Philippines, Boracay","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (0.95), compliance_legal (0.85), operator_casino (0.9), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.75), journalist_researcher (0.95)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Boracay IR Governance?","query":"What specific governance frameworks and regulatory compliance measures would be proposed to mitigate environmental impact and ensure sustainable development if Integrated Resort projects proceed in Boracay?"},{"label":"Addressing Past IR Failures?","query":"How does the Philippine government plan to address the historical opposition and past project failures, such as the Galaxy Entertainment and LRWC venture, to ensure long-term viability and investor confidence for new IR developments?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,158,16333],"tags":[22935,23907],"class_list":["post-22125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-casino-news","category-slider-home","category-south-east-asia-news","tag-galaxy-entertainment","tag-land-based-casino"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22125"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22125\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22142,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22125\/revisions\/22142"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}