Atong Ang reportedly in Vietnam as PH authorities verify

MANILA, Philippines – Gambling tycoon Atong Ang may now be in Vietnam, according to Interior and Local Government Secretary Jonvic Remulla.

“We got intelligence reports that he’s there in Vietnam,” Remulla told reporters in a phone interview on Tuesday.

“We’re verifying with our counterparts in Vietnam whether this is true,” he added.

READ: Atong Ang manhunt: 10 raids in past week fail to find him — Remulla

He noted that their latest information indicated Ang may have left for Vietnam last month.

However, in an interview on DZBB earlier on Tuesday, Remulla said their intelligence showed Ang may have left for Vietnam two weeks before local courts issued warrants for his arrest.

The Inquirer sought further comment from Remulla on the discrepancy, but he has yet to respond as of this writing.

Nonetheless, Remulla said local law enforcement is still looking for Ang at his and his known associates’ addresses in the Philippines with nearly 200 attempts to serve his arrest warrant since January.

READ: ‘Atong Ang is not in our country,’ says Cambodian foreign ministry

“He’s still negative here with all his known cohorts and associates. We’ve gone to many places. It’s all negative. We’ll never stop looking,” he added.

Courts in Laguna and Batangas issued warrants for Ang’s arrest last January.

Twenty of Ang’s co-accused were arrested shortly after the warrants were released, leaving the gambling tycoon as the sole accused still at large.

They face kidnapping charges.

Whistleblower Julie Patidongan (also known as Totoy or Dondon) previously alleged that Ang and his cohorts had the sabungeros kidnapped, killed, and thrown into Taal Lake for allegedly cheating in the gambling tycoon’s cockfights between 2021 and 2022.

READ: Counsel asks DOJ to exclude Atong Ang in Manila ‘sabungeros’ case

“He has no records that he went through the BI (Bureau of Immigration), so most probably, he went through the backdoor, the Mindanao part,” Remulla explained.

“Backdoor” refers to illegal exit points, commonly in the southern Philippines, used to bypass immigration authorities.

Ang was previously believed to have fled to Cambodia, but its foreign ministry maintained that the tycoon was not hiding in their country.

The Inquirer sought comment from Ang’s legal counsel, Gabriel Villareal, but he has yet to respond as of writing. /dl

First posted 10:40 am