News Roundup 03 October 2022
Oct 03, 2022 • 6 min Read
433 bettors bag P236-million Grand Lotto jackpot | INQUIRER.NET – What are the odds of winning the lottery? According to a statistician of the University of the Philippines (UP), it’s a one-in-28,989,675 chance, considering the six-number combinations in the 6/55 Grand Lotto draw of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO). Yet on Saturday night, the PCSO made history — or rather became qualified to be cited by Ripley’s, the American franchise dealing in events so unusual that people doubt the claims — after 433 bettors beat the odds to win and share the P236-million Grand Lotto jackpot. Each winner from that draw will get P545,245.24, which is subject to a final tax of 20 percent. Furthermore, the winning combination became quite unique for its arithmetic progression consisting of multiples of nine: 9-18-27-36-45-54. Netizens openly wondered about Saturday’s draw, considering the seeming astronomical odds of that combination. “Isn’t it suspicious? Maybe they are relatives, or same company, or same political circle, or by the same person or groups of persons. In cahoots with PCSO, with advance knowledge of winning combination?” said one tweet. Another recalled a 2018 lottery in the United States in which all 11 winners of the $543-million jackpot happened to be coworkers, although that circumstance turned out to be just pure luck. Other tweets called for an investigation into the results. Peter Julian Cayton, associate professor of UP’s School of Statistics, said in an interview that “over the past 20 years, we had only two or three winners, but the general pattern of these numbers did not have a structure as compared to the most recent multiples of 9 in a result.” He said that combination, like other seemingly ridiculous combinations like 05-15-25-35-45-55, 01-02-03-04-05-06, “rarely happens, but [it] can.” He also explained that 433 people choosing 09-18-27-36-45-54 was still likely, as there were “many people who choose with a fixed set of numbers, and many would base it on a pattern to easily memorize them. And often, it’s based on a personal level.” “A feature of being human is to do things beyond the rules of nature and finding pattern and order in chaos,” he added. Cayton said it was difficult to compute the odds of 433 winning “because here, subjectivity on how we make choices affects how many may win.” “Without additional information, 433 winners in a jackpot is not impossible but it is [a] very, very small [likelihood] that even with 43 people winning, the chance is… smaller than the smallest length possible in physics in meters, known as Planck Length,” he said, referring to the measurement named after physicist Max Planck.
Watchdogs: Selection of CHR appointees lacked transparency, consultation | PHILSTAR.COM – Appointments to vacancies at the Commission on Human Rights did not include consultations with civil society groups, rights watchdogs said, adding the process of picking commissioners was not transparent. Former Malacañang deputy secretary Richard Palpal-latoc is the new chairperson of the CHR while former Ombudsman investigator Beda Espres has been named a commissioner. CHR needs three more commissioners. As rights groups called on the new CHR appointees to show independence and transparency in investigating violations involving civil and political rights, they also noted the lack of transparency and consultation in how they were selected. Under the Paris Principles, the composition of a national human rights institution and the appointment of its members should ensure the pluralist representation of the social forces involved in the protection and promotion of human rights. Ideally, commissions should have representation from NGOs working in human rights, from trade unions and from other civil society orgaizations. The Paris Principles are international standards that frame and guide the work of NHRIs like the CHR. Karapatan secretary general Kristina Palabay said “many, if not all, in our network” were excluded from consultations on the appointments. “The lack of transparency and consultative character of the selection process of the CHR is a policy statement by itself on how administration views human rights and human rights defenders, its appreciation on enabling environment for civic and democratic space, and its commitment to international human rights standards such as the Paris Principles on national human rights institutions,” Palabay told Philstar.com Monday. In June, New York-based watchdog Human Rights Watch suggested that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. convene an independent search committee to vet candidates and come up with a shortlist for appointees. It also urged the government to encourage participation from civil society organizations so they could suggest candidates representing vulnerable sectors. HRW senior researcher Carlos Conde stressed that consultation is “absolutely critical” because CSOs play an equally critical role in promoting human rights and in ensuring accountability for abuses. CSOs also serve as a check on government and on the commission. “CSOs are a pillar in the human rights movement, especially since we’ve seen how the government can often be resistant to accountability, as in the case of the Duterte administration,” Conde told Philstar.com. “If the new admin cannot see the role of CSOs and transparency in all this, then CSOs cannot be faulted for thinking that it is not serious about human rights,” he said, adding the administration could also misuse the commission or render it ineffective.
ICC help not needed in probing drug war – OSG | PHILSTAR.COM – The Marcos administration has opted to sit out the counterarguments of the International Criminal Court’s prosecutors against the Philippines’ attempt to stop the investigation into the drug war killings during former president Rodrigo Duterte’s administration, the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) said yesterday, adding that they would instead wait for the ICC’s decision. Noting how there was already nothing the government can do to change ICC prosecutor Karim Khan’s mind about investigating the Philippine situation, Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra said the Philippines is instead currently waiting for the ICC pre-trial chamber (PTC) to decide whether the probe will resume or not before the Marcos administration makes another move. “(Khan) didn’t state anything new and right from the start, his mindset is fixed on resuming the investigation of the Philippine situation that’s why we opted to not reply anymore and simply wait for the resolution of the PTC of the ICC,” Guevarra said in an interview aired over radio station dzBB. “Why do you have to interfere with our investigations that we are doing? You may not be happy with the results so far, but it doesn’t mean that our judicial and legal system is not functioning. We don’t need you,” he added, addressing ICC prosecutors. ICC prosecutors on Sept. 22 rejected the Philippine government’s submission to the PTC, which argued the ICC’s lack of jurisdiction over the Philippines, the drug war’s inadmissibility of account of the Rome Statute’s Article 17 and the complementarity principle in international law. ICC prosecutors, led by Khan, an international criminal law expert, said the Philippines’ submission last Sept. 8, which was penned by the OSG and supplied with evidence by the Department of Justice, fell short of providing strong arguments to stop the investigation on the Philippines. Khan said these arguments are not backed by strong evidence that could boost the ICC’s confidence that the Philippines can resolve the alleged crimes against humanity on its own as the government and its investigating agencies failed to demonstrate in its Sept. 8 submission “past or ongoing national proceedings that could match” the looming ICC investigation.
