Only some two percent of the gambling community, according to Business Day, the South African publication, will be engaged in online gambling in comparison to eighty percent playing in brick and mortar casinos, reported by the government office of the Department of Trade and Industry in South Africa.

In order to contend with the statements by the South African Casino Association that in introducing Internet gambling a detrimental result would ensue on its casino players these figures were employed.

According to Fungai Sibanda, the DTI acting deputy director, who this week addressed the Parliamentary Trade and Industry Committee, interactive gambling does not appear to be nothing threatening the brick and mortar casino sphere, and stated that online gambling's monetary feasibility would be determined by the market.

The response by Sibanda was to the proposed changes to the National Gambling Amendment Bill suggested by gaming operators and groups of civil society and religious affiliated. For the first time in South Africa online gambling would be legalized by the bill as well as regulated.

The casino operators' demand that they receive licenses to operate online gaming automatically was refuted by Sibanda too, claiming that automatic authorization has no accepted legality throughout the globe.

Transparency, honesty and openness must relate to the authorizing of licenses in order to enable new participants into the field. One to one wager exchanges, Sibanda emphasized, as suggested by the British operator Betfair, would not be allowed prior to finalizing an investigation into its effects, and this was still far from taking place.    

The regulation issuing by Mandisi Mpahlwa, the Minister of Trade and Industry, will decide for all participants the registration and authentication involved.

Posted on: September 17, 2007

Add This Gambling Article To:
Del.icio.us	Digg	Google	Spurl
Furl	Simpy	Y! MyWeb

Back to September 2007's archive
Back to latest News