The much-loved Star City was deliberately set on fire, an official announced yesterday, and theme park’s owners and tenants are now under suspicion.
Pasay City Fire Marshal Paul Pili said a group of park tenants brought “cotton materials” into the theme park before it was almost entirely destroyed in the Wednesday pre-dawn inferno. Park owners deny any role in the fire.
“They brought some cotton materials that night and they were with someone, a certain Mr. Wong,” Pili told Rappler in English and Filipino. “There were several people with [Wong] and their names weren’t registered in the [guard’s] logbook.”
Pili said the case was being handled as arson despite the investigation not being complete.
He also told ABS-CBN News that gasoline was found spilled “in an area where it should not be.”
Pili said they would ask the park’s owners to present financial documents so they could determine if it was losing money to bolster his torched-their-own-place theory/conclusion.
Read: Sadness, nostalgia after suspected arson fire ravages Star City theme park
“We will look into it if they are losing money or not. That’s where we will see if there’s a motive [to commit arson] because it’s hard to pinpoint who caused the fire.” Pili said.
Star City’s management dismissed Pili’s suspicions, saying it was “inappropriate” to make such statements before the investigation was concluded.
“We not aware of any motive, including financial gain, that would induce the commission on [sic] arson especially on the part of Star City as the business is profitable and a bumper Christmas Season was expected,” the park said in a Sunday statement published on its Facebook page, which seems inaccessible outside the Philippines.
It also said there was nothing unusual about bringing cotton into the compound because it is used for stuffed toys that are used as prizes.
“The circumstances earlier cited in the media cannot, therefore, be concluded that there was arson,” it said.
Filipinos have expressed much sadness over the destruction of Star City, an attraction where families gathered since it opened in 1991. The theme park previously said it aims to reopen in October 2020.
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