The dangers posed by gambling far outweigh the benefits

A resident of Nyalenda slum in Kisumu County gambles using a slot machine on September 15, 2016. Betting is money lost. PHOTO | TONNY OMONDI | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Sports betting has become the opium on which the Kenyan youth gets hooked to drown his misery with illusions of grandeur.
  • Losing one’s money to gambling frequently has a way of diminishing one’s confidence and making one insecure.

According to a GeoPoll survey, Kenya has the highest number of betting youth in sub-Saharan Africa with at least 76 per cent of them having participated in gambling.

With unemployment figures as high as 39 per cent and the Kenyan love for football, sports betting has become the opium on which the Kenyan youth gets hooked to drown his misery with illusions of grandeur.

The same research revealed that the youth spent an average Sh5,000 a month on the habit, the highest on the continent.

Even for the employed, this figure is too high.

PROBLEM GAMBLERS
Leading researchers have defined low risk gambling as: gambling no more than two to three times per month, or spending less than a total of Sh50,000 per year; or gambling less than one per cent of gross family income.

People who exceed one or more of these criteria can be described as problem gamblers.

The Canadian Public Health Association defines problem gambling as a progressive disorder characterised by a continuous or periodic loss of control over gambling, preoccupation with gambling and money with which to gamble, irrational thinking, or continuation of the activity despite adverse consequences.

While sport betting is different from casino gambling in that it depends on a clever guess on the gambler and not chance, it is still a gamble and has the same catastrophic consequences.

With this background, we can assert that Kenya is dealing with problem gambling.

SPORTPESA JACKPOT
Last week, Mr Gordon Opiyo, a resident of Kibera slums, won the weekly Sportpesa jackpot of Sh231 million after correctly predicting 17 matches.

The jackpot win and the fact that these betting companies sponsor popular local football teams create an attractive appeal to the youth.

But, the costs to the State, the society, family and the individual make sports betting equivalent to selling one’s birthright for a morsel of bread.

Gambling firms play up the revenues earned by the government but the costs to the State are often higher.

There is a strong connection between gambling and crime through pathological gambling.

This gambling is defined by the American Psychiatric Association as “persistent and recurrent mal-adaptive gambling behaviour as indicated by five (or more) of” 10 items.

CRIME

Among these behaviours are illegal acts such as forgery, fraud, and theft to finance gambling.

The crimes attract crime costs that relate to policing, apprehension, prosecution, and imprisonment if ever.

More importantly, the money thrown at gambling, if saved, could spur the country’s savings, strengthen the currency and increase economic growth.

Pension and bank savings ordinarily contribute to the capital formation in the nation.

Betting on the other hand, is money lost.

The benefits are thus not accrued when half the population throws its savings into gambling.

For instance, if a million Kenyans saved Sh5,000 every month for the next one year, that is Sh60 billion.

This is money that could be multiplied in the economy by lending to productive businesses.

However, it is money surrendered as sponsorship to English football clubs like Everton, Sunderland and Arsenal.

INVESTMENT
To the society, gambling companies market employment creation.

In real sense, the money directed at betting firms is money forfeited by other businesses namely restaurants and shops.

The money could be saved or invested with a Sacco or even the stock market.

This means in the long run, the jobs in these establishments will be lost to create one or two positions at the gambling firms.

In essence, for one gambling job created, four have been lost in the various retail chains.

Moreover, gambling creates non-productivity at work due to anxiety, stress, lost man-hours and employee turnover costs.

PRODUCTIVITY

The employer suffers the loss. Conversely, when a person loses their job the problem gets magnified as the weight of his unemployment is borne by the community.

In the end is a potential bankruptcy, costly to the society at large.

Undoubtedly, the family loses more in the gambling cycle.

Addicted family members are known to steal resources or take funds assigned elsewhere to meet their gambling needs.

These incidents are hardly reported. Worse, problem gambling tends to lead to domestic violence, divorce, child abuse or neglect buoyed by the psychological instability.

RISK

In many instances, the gambler is in denial until it’s too late.

The gambler is equally vulnerable to his or her deeds.

Losing one’s money to gambling frequently has a way of diminishing one’s confidence and making one insecure.

Tax or no tax, the cost benefit analysis of betting brings a negative report card in its disfavour.

Odhiambo is an economist and analyst @Odhiamboramogi