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Nigerians’ addiction to betting games

By Maria Famakinwa

The marriage of Mr Jerry, a 44-year-old father of three is at the brink of collapse after his wife’s several efforts to discourage him from betting game yielded no positive results.

Jerry’s addiction to betting game was so serious that he started selling his property to play the game. The recent of his property sold was the generator he bought for N180,000 last year December which he sold for N40,000. His wife became enraged when she discovered and was considering moving out of her matrimonial home with the children.

Jerry is not the only man addicted to betting game, Mr Fakehinde, a civil servant also narrated his experience before he said he was delivered.

 His words: “A friend introduced me to betting game as a way out of my indebtedness. He said I should pray to pick the lucky numbers so that I could win huge amount of money which was never so.

“He convinced me not to stop trying that in a game one could not expect to always be a winner. The urge to win pushed me to sell some of my belongings to play the game for three years with nothing to show for it except regrets. My sister got to know and reported me to my parents. I was seriously scolded. That was how I regained my senses.

“I must open up to you that some civil servants not only spend their salaries on betting, they also obtained loans from cooperatives to play betting games with the mentality that they would hit millions of naira and settle the loans but most of them ended up in deeper financial crisis.

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“Though if one wins, it might be a major financial breakthrough, but losing can take one back to zero level. Another thing I discovered about betting games was that there is a spirit pushing one to play the game that one would win in order to put the person in financial bondage. This is the major reason most men cannot perform their financial obligations at home.”

The Hope asked Mr Kazeem, who was sighted at a poll spot his interest in betting game he said, “I play betting game because I understand it and good at it. I have won times without number and I believe that I will still win huge amount of money if I keep trying.

“How much will I earn as a salary that can be compared to winning big in betting game? If mother luck smile on me and I hit the target, I will be financially settled for life. I am a salary earner but my monthly take home is not enough to cater for me and my family. Most civil servants argument their salaries with the money realized from betting games,” he said.

A woman who sells fairly used clothes, Margret, also revealed that she play poll and that there was nothing bad in trying one’s luck.

When told that it was unbelievable women play betting games said, “why is it surprising that women play betting games when they also need money? Most of my female friends play the game. For me, I prefer poll to match betting because I don’t like sport.”

On when she started playing the game and highest money won so far she said: “I started playing poll in 2015 and the highest money I have wonwas N360,000 which I used to start my business. The fact that some cannot do what others are doing does not make it wrong since it is not robbery. Playing game is meeting people’s economical needs and should not be condemned,” she said.

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A man who own a betting game outlet, Mr Opeyemi Idowu, disclosed that 70 percent of Nigerians play betting games either through their mobile phones or visiting betting game outlets  adding that the game provides additional income to many which explained why it daily attracts high patronage.

On how they play the game said: “Each game comes with three specific numbers which represent a winning number, a draw number and a lose number. A player of the game is expected to predict the outcome of a particular football match by either choosing any of the three numbers above. If what the person predicted earlier was the outcome of the match, the person will be rewarded for predicting correctly.

“However, rewarding the correct prediction depends on the money at stake, which is the money the person used to play the game. If the person played the game with N100, the amount that will be displayed as the cash to be given to the person will be small compare with someone who played with N1000 or more. Some people who actually understand the game play with one million naira and above because the more the money at stake, the more the amount to be won. It is also possible to win  jackpot if one’s ticket number corresponds with the jackpot number displayed on the screen but it is very rare.”

Asked why Nigerians men are addicted to betting games, he said, “it is not only men who play betting games, some women are good at playing the game better than men. If not for betting games, incidence of criminality would have been worse than what we are currently experiencing. Believe it or not, most men feed their families from the money made through betting games.

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” Women who play the game will not keep coming if they are not winning. Majority of our customers are salary earners, musicians, youths, artisans among others. They all  depend on betting games to survive. Betting games generate billions of naira to the government yearly, helps men to fulfill their financial roles as the breadwinners and also serves as an opportunity for the citizens to ease the untold economic hardship being experienced in the country,” he said.

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Nigerians’ addiction to betting games

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