Kenyans invest in bets and bet on investments: let’s ban it!

By MUNGAI KIHANYA

The Sunday Nation

Nairobi,

04 May 2025

Mista Nyambati is concerned about the proliferation of betting in Kenya. He writes: “With the gambling craze in Kenya almost degenerating into a serious national security threat, why don't you one day do an article about how these gambling houses do their 'math' so as to ensure that at the end of the day, it is the house that wins?”

Mista is right: the joke on the streets is that Kenyans invest in bets and bet on investments. You will often hear people saying things like “I am trying my luck in the restaurant business” or “I have made good profits from sports betting”.

There are even “betting consultants” who claim they can help gamblers increase the chances of winning! Now, I have written several articles about the gambling in this column. The first one was in February 2005 (20 years ago) and the latest one appeared in July 2019. The bottom line is simple: your chances of winning are almost zero!

Furthermore, if you win, say, one billion shillings in one round, and then place the whole amount in the next round of betting, your second winnings will be less than one billion. The reason is that the chances of winning are intentionally made fewer than those of losing. That’s the meaning of the saying “the house always wins”.

Consequently, for every jackpot winner you see celebrated in the media, there are millions of losers crying in their toilets. In short: gambling adds nothing to society and, if it was up to me, I would ban it completely and put very steep penalties on anyone found engaging in it!

Betting companies claim that they are adding value by sponsoring various social activities, like sports and the like. However, the amounts they put in these sponsorships is much smaller than what they collect in wagers.

It reminds me of the time the tobacco industry was making similar claims – that they contribute to society by paying taxes and engaging in philanthropy. Then health professionals did some calculations and found that, for every tax shilling paid by this industry, the government spends Sh1.20 in taking care of people with smoking-related diseases!

So, what can be done? I would propose very strict controls with severe penalties (heavy fines and long jail terms) for those breaking the rules. In addition, betting companies should be barred from sponsoring sports and from advertising in any medium. We’ve done this to tobacco, we can do it to gambling.