Plans have been revived by Roberto Ongpin in his efforts to use his shares of the PhilWeb Corporation to try and help the company after the Philippine amusement and Gaming Corporation rejected or seemingly ignored his efforts to renew the firm’s license. Ongpin is now trying to donate all of his shares and have them sold and the money used to build rehabilitation centers.

A letter was written by Ongpin and sent to the board of directors of PhilWeb which was shared with the Philippine Stock Exchange on September 5th. In the letter, Ongpin stated that after having resigned as chairman of the company and after making several offers to PAGCOR, all of which were either rejected or ignored, Ongpin feels it is obvious that if he remains a shareholder of PhilWeb, there is no chance the company will be allowed a favorable reception on a proposal to PAGCOR.

The latest proposal by Ongpin to PAGCOR was to donate each share he has within PhilWeb and then the company could sell these shares. The money could then be used to build rehabilitation centers. Ongpin’s stake in PhilWeb is now considered to be worth anywhere from P4 billion to P5 billion after the price os shares dropped over the past few weeks. Ongpin has 771 million shares which under normal circumstances would be worth around P20 billion (US$429,876,400).

The original plan of Ongpin was to use his PhilWeb shares and put them up for auction to the public in the hopes that PAGCOR would provide a renewal of the firm’s license. The proposals by Ongpin were not received well due to President Rodrigo Duterte’s goal of correcting or stopping previous gaming policies.

On the 4th of September, Ongpin renewed his plan to bid out all of his shares and donating the proceeds  to the government’s drug rehabilitation program. Ongpin feels that he has no option left but to take his shares of PhilWeb and remove himself from the company in order to save PhilWeb and the employees within the company.

Ongpin says that abandoning PhilWeb is ‘heartbreaking’ as he has been involved for 16 years and the directors and employees have helped him grow the company into a successful and profitable enterprise. However, it seems that he has no other choice but to totally exit from PhilWeb if the company has a chance to survive.