Sports betting craze leaves trail of broken families, agony

What you need to know:

  • The most tragic case is that of Mr Kennedy Kosgei from Eldoret, who borrowed Sh45,000 from Kenya Commercial Bank and placed all the stake on Spanish football club Real Madrid.

  • He was found hanging from a tree soon afterwards, after his beloved team lost to arch rivals Atletico Madrid via a solitary goal.

  • Another man who works in a Nairobi bank lost Sh500,000 that he had borrowed to bet on the same match.

  • The 42-year-old suffered double tragedy when his wife left him after she learnt that her husband had lost their Sh500,000 loan to Sportpesa.

The betting craze that has engulfed the country has turned into a source of pain for some families, with individuals committing suicide and losing property and students squandering school fees.

In some instances, the betting has led to families breaking up.

The most tragic case is that of Mr Kennedy Kosgei of Eldoret, who borrowed Sh45,000 from Kenya Commercial Bank and placed all the stake on Spanish football club Real Madrid using two different accounts on online betting firm Sportpesa.

He was found hanging from a tree soon afterwards, after his beloved team lost to arch-rivals Atletico Madrid via a solitary goal.

Another man who works in a Nairobi bank lost Sh500,000 that he had borrowed to bet on the same match.

The 42-year-old suffered double tragedy when his wife left him after she learnt that her husband had lost their Sh500,000 loan to Sportpesa.

The company encourages responsible betting and does not take responsibility for the decisions of the gamblers.

It has also spelt out strict terms and conditions of betting, including being responsible in placing bets.

Many people, however, do not follow the advice, and that is why a Maseno University student lost Sh40,000 intended for his tuition fees to betting.

Mr Moses Omwoyo said his Higher Education Loans Board cash “disappeared in only 90 minutes”.

“It was a big disappointment in my life,” he said.

“That was the only cash I had after making a withdrawal from my bank account. I hate gambling because it just ruined my life.”

RENT GONE

Mr Jack Ogolla, a Kisumu-based taxi driver, says his wife packed and left after he lost their rent money in a bet.

Mr Ogolla, an ardent fan of Manchester United, gambled all his rent money on the assumption that his beloved team would walk over the Danish team FC Midtjylland.

As fate would have it, he lost the bet after Manchester united lost 2-1 in the Uefa Europa League rounds. His wife packed up and left.

Ms Millicent Atieno says she left her husband after he became addicted to sports betting and gambled away a lot of family property as a result.

“Most of the time he would come back without money,” she said. “When he lost his bets, he would use more money to win them back but he kept on losing.”

The two divorced when Ms Atieno felt her husband was becoming an emotional and economic burden.

Dr Charles Muga, a behavioural scientist, says legalised gambling has become a common form of entertainment for many people.

However, he cautions, few people understand how it works.

“It is very important that everyone understands how betting works before getting into it because the effects are bitter to swallow,” he says.

Most of the young people engaging in gambling have stopped looking at it as a source of entertainment, and see it as a means of making money, he says.

“They bet with huge amounts of money meant for other things and when they lose they get depressed and frustrated.”

The impact of betting has become so huge that Sports Cabinet Secretary Hassan Wario called on the Interior ministry to stop registering new sports betting companies.

Speaking during a rules and regulations meeting for the national sports funds, Dr Wario cautioned that the country has too many gambling firms with no lottery office. 

“The million-dollar question is: why don’t we have a lottery office?... Our request to the Ministry of Interior is, stop registering all these thousands of betting companies. We must control this sector,” he said.