South Africa’s Newly Drafted Bill to Consider Legalizing Online Gambling

South Africa is considering revoking the 2008 National Gambling Act and introducing a new bill that will legalize gambling online. With the current bill, the country only allows online sports betting, but eGR reported that Mr. Geordin Hill-Lewis, a South African MP has proposed a new bill that seeks an inclusion of the internet casino gambling.

Recently, commercial interests have been applying a lot of pressure on the South African lawmakers. These commercial interests are against the rapid increase of gaming sites that are unregulated. Taxation and consumer protection are displayed as reasons for the lawmakers to consider an approval of regulated Internet wagering. This situation seems to be similar to the voices of Internet online gambling proponents in the USA.

The Director of a law firm in South Africa, Mr. Wayne Lurie commented, “Our standards have fallen below the international standards from the past eight years and its right time we made developments to be at par”

The newly drafted bill is similar to that of Australia and Europe which allows the licensing to be overseen by provincial and national governments. Applicants for Online gaming license will apply through any of the ten provinces in South Africa in a similar fashion to that of Australia’s regulatory procedures. Krugerbets and Sportingbet who hold gaming licenses in the country will have to apply again for permission to operate online. They will have to do this through a remote gaming license. Categories like manufacturers, operators and suppliers will be established.

The proposal for this new bill calls out for individual provinces to determine the taxation. The bill proposes 70% tax on gross will be taken by the provinces and the national government will collect 30%. However, to abolish provincial competition, levels and standards will be established.

Mr. Tyrone Dubbin, the Managing Director of Sportingbet commented that this regulation would assist them to satisfy the growing demands of the customers and offer gambling products in a secure online environment that abided by the consumer protection and local regulatory controls.