WINDOWS
Gabriel L. Cardinoza

Will the ameneng (hataw, video karera) machines finally go for good? We ask because with the high-profile campaign against these illegal gaming machines, with no less than Gov. Victor Agbayani and Mayor Benjamin Lim ordering the police to confiscate these on sight, we can only imagine its operators running in all directions with their machines in tow, putting an end to a vice that have been luring school-aged children.

As of this writing, Dagupan City police chief Ed Basbas was announcing on television that his operatives have already confiscated 31 such machines from the different barangays of the city. Good catch, so far. But we also heard him say that there may be more machines hidden inside many houses and that they would need search warrants to get them.

And there goes that tired and overused line again. I thought I was hearing the police say that they could not stop the illegal numbers game jueteng because these were guerilla-type operations and that the draws were held inside moving vehicles, or in the outskirts of the province, etc., etc.

If the police are doing their work right, and if they are doing it with sincerity and commitment and with a little imagination and resourcefulness, it should be easy to pinpoint the houses that operate these ameneng/hataw/video karera machines in a barangay. They can always deploy plainclothesmen and even assets (not asses) to locate these machines and its owners and operators. And to do this, I do not think they would need the sophisticated electronic gadgets that the Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines allegedly used in the controversial Garci tapes.

But have the police done this? Let the result of their operations speak for itself. Clearly, all they had were machines. No warm bodies. No owners. No operators. Clearly, the result of their operations left some questions unanswered: Where do these machines come from? Where are these machines manufactured? Who is/are the distributor/s of these machines? Why is it that the owners of the houses where the machines were found were not at all charged?

There should be more in the campaign against these illegal machines. Even with limited resources (as they always complain about), we believe that the police can still hit its target. We believe that if only they put their hearts in the campaign, they will save thousands of children from addiction to this vice.

And that’s a big “if.”

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Finally, Dagupan City is now listed in the Guinness World Records website (and in the Guinness Book 2006 edition, we were told) for having created the world’s longest barbecue. This should be enough source of pride for the people of Dagupan City, especially those who took part in the Kalutan ed Dalan during the Bangus Festival.

But wait, something’s wrong with the data that Guinness had posted. In its website, the entry reads:

“Longest barbecue: The longest barbecue measured 1,007.56 m (3,305.64ft) and was created by the people of Dagupan City, Philippines, on 3 May 2003 as part of the city’s Bangus Festival.”

This entry is not quite correct because this record has been broken by Turkey when Guinness confirmed in January 2004 that it has built a 1,600-meter barbecue. Sam Knights, Guinness press assistant, in response to this corner’s inquiry in December 2004 on why Dagupan City’s feat of creating a barbecue more than that of Peru’s 613 meters, was never posted in its website wrote:

“Sorry for the delay in answering your question. The reason for the confusion lies in the complicated verification process that is necessary to make sure all Guinness World Records are genuine. The current world record holder is Turkey, with a barbecue of 1,600m which was built in December 2002. However, the correct evidence for this record attempt was not collated and verified for various reasons until January 2004. In between the time before the Turkish barbecue was built and the evidence was confirmed, a barbecue in the Philippines, measuring 1,007m (beating the previous record of 613m in Peru ), was built (May 2003) and the evidence was confirmed (November 2003). Therefore, Dagupan City in the Philippines held the record, and were (sic) given the certificate correctly, before the evidence from Turkey was finally verified. When this important evidence was received the record was then given to the barbecue in Turkey. This is now confirmed on the website.

I hope this clears up the confusion. Please let me know if you have any further questions”

Dagupan City, of course, has built a 2,200 meter-long barbecue in May last year, longer than that of Turkey’s 1,600 meters.

But despite the city government’s immediate submission of the documentation, this feat has not been confirmed yet by Guinness. With the inaccurate post in the Guinness website, something must be very wrong in Guinness’ record-keeping system. Is it possible that the other world records posted in its website may not also be accurate? Just asking.