Uganda Moves in Force Against Illegal Gambling Market

The National Lotteries and Gaming Regulatory Board (NLGRB) has intensified its efforts to uproot illegal operators that continue to target the country’s citizens by bombarding them with gambling advertisements and tailored offers.

Uganda Takes Harder Aim at Unregulated Gambling

Denis Mudene Ngabirano, who leads the NLGRB, has vowed to crack down on the sector and ensure that consumers are protected from the pernicious influence of offshore and unregulated gambling sites that have continued to target the local market despite all.

“The National Lotteries and Gaming Regulatory Board was created by Parliament through the Lotteries and Gaming Act, CAP 334. Our main mandate is to supervise and regulate all gaming activities while ensuring citizens are protected from gaming’s harmful effects,” Ngabirano explained.

It’s not just the offshore gambling sites that have been targeting the country, however. Many land-based operations have also mushroomed, with small venues hosting several to a few dozen slot machines appearing all over the country.

Ngabirano has said that the regulator has worked together with the Uganda Police Force to ensure that such small operations are dismantled as they are discovered.

There have been thousands of illegal slot machines confiscated by Ngabirano’s regulatory crackdown in collaboration with the police. In one operation, more than 5,000 such machines have been confiscated nationwide.

Neither land-based nor online gambling seems to have been hurt too badly by these efforts so far. Data about the scale of illegal operations in Uganda is patchy at best. Recently, the country was embroiled in a high-profile scandal after allegations were made that the Ugandan embassy in Dubai was running a casino.