{"id":26874,"date":"2022-02-02T09:16:05","date_gmt":"2022-02-02T12:16:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=26874"},"modified":"2026-04-23T11:41:42","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T14:41:42","slug":"more-christian-groups-join-fight-against-opol-casino","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/more-christian-groups-join-fight-against-opol-casino","title":{"rendered":"More Christian groups join fight against Opol casino"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>At least eight influential religious leaders in Cagayan de Oro have signed a position paper against the reopening of the Grand Imperial Casino.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>The Philippines.- One of the largest Protestant churches in Cagayan de Oro,\u00a0<strong>the United Church of the Christian Church of the Philippines (UCCP)\u00a0<\/strong>and several evangelical groups have joined other religious organisations in calling on authorities to shut down the Grand Imperial Casino.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>At least eight influential religious leaders in Cagayan de Oro have signed a paper<\/strong>\u00a0calling on their members to work together to stop the PAGCOR Casino, which has temporarily closed due to\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/pagcors-new-opol-casino-shuts-its-doors-until-january-31\">Covid-19 countermeasures<\/a>\u00a0until at least February 15.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The joint statement reads: &#8220;We call on our churches and faith communities to work together in opposing the operation of the casino that is leading the community to immorality. We call on the LGU (local government unit) of Opol municipality to resolve this issue by taking comprehensive action that would benefit the people in the community.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In January, authorities found Grand Imperial Casino had been&nbsp;<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/opol-casino-found-to-be-operating-without-a-business-permit\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">operating without a business<\/a>&nbsp;permit since it opened in December.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At least eight influential religious leaders in Cagayan de Oro have signed a position paper against the reopening of the Grand Imperial Casino.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":20663,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Religious leaders in Cagayan de Oro, Philippines, are actively opposing the reopening of the Grand Imperial Casino, which was temporarily closed due to COVID-19 measures. The casino was also found to be operating without a business permit since its December opening, prompting calls from religious groups and local government units for its permanent closure due to regulatory non-compliance and community concerns.","focusai_entities":"Grand Imperial Casino, United Church of the Christian Church of the Philippines (UCCP), PAGCOR, LGU Opol","focusai_location":"Philippines, Cagayan de Oro, Opol","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.9), investor_analyst (0.85), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (0.95)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"PAGCOR Enforcement Action?","query":"What specific enforcement actions will PAGCOR undertake against Grand Imperial Casino given its operation without a business permit and the strong local government and community opposition?"},{"label":"Social License Impact?","query":"How will this incident influence the broader regulatory landscape and the social license to operate for other iGaming and land-based casino operators in the Philippines, particularly concerning local community engagement and permit acquisition?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,158,16333],"tags":[23907,405],"class_list":["post-26874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-casino-news","category-slider-home","category-south-east-asia-news","tag-land-based-casino","tag-pagcor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26874","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=26874"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26874\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26901,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26874\/revisions\/26901"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}