Insider Spotlight
Speaking at a press briefing, Tuason said he foresees the number of licensed gun owners rising from over two million to four million, as streamlined licensing processes and clarified firearm classifications encourage more civilians to register their weapons.
“I expect gun ownership to go from over two million legal gun owners in the Philippines, hopefully to four million very quickly,” Tuason said. “The biggest benefit of that is that the Philippine National Police will collect more fees and be able to sustain a better police force.”
Tuason stressed that most gun crimes in the country are committed using illegal firearms, not legally acquired ones.
“Who’s going to undergo a background check and registration of firearms just to commit a crime? I don’t think there’s anybody who would do that,” he said. “We don’t buy guns because we want to commit crimes. We buy guns to deter crimes.”
Defense industry boost
The Armscor executive added that the legislative overhaul will significantly benefit the Philippine economy, particularly the defense manufacturing sector, which he said has long been prepared for industry expansion under the Self-Reliant Defense Posture (SRDP) program.
“Why are we going to buy from a foreign company? Let’s buy from our own people,” Tuason said, noting Armscor’s ability to scale up from producing commercial firearms to supplying military-grade equipment.
“If we start building cannons and other items, we can go from 2,000 to maybe 20,000 employees. Multiply that across the industry and we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of jobs.”
Tuason credited the near-unanimous passage of the amended firearms law to the alignment of pro-defense lawmakers and President Marcos, who has prioritized SRDP legislation and is himself a known firearms sports enthusiast.
“Every peso we’ve earned we reinvested into expanding our capacity,” Tuason said. “We’re ready. The industry is ready. And now, the law is catching up.”
