Distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to welcome you to the world regulatory briefing-taking place here in Lagos, Nigeria. This is the first time the WRB will take place in Africa and actually the 2nd gaming event to take place in Nigeria within the space of a year – I am proud to be associated with both events, it simply signposts the industry’s growth.
Before going further lets cast our selves to the state of the industry say about 10 years ago. While trying to set up the company of our first client, the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), would not allow us mention words like casino, slots, betting etc. in the objects of the company, because according to them “it was a banned activity”. I believe that people generally confused the 1977 ban on the importation of slot machines as a general ban on all gaming activities.
In short our client had barely commenced its operations when it was inundated with investigations from several government institutions like immigration and the Federal Inland Revenue Service. The attitude was more persecutorial than actually ensuring compliance with their law. Any way we late heard that the minister in charge had lost money in our clients’ casino; smarting from that loss he ordered the National Lottery Regulatory Commission to investigate all the casinos in Abuja. The truth of that allegation cannot be verified but I recall that the NLRC tried to license and regulate us soon afterwards but we couldn’t find the enabling regulation. So at a meeting of the Abuja casino operators we agreed to set up an association and I was unanimously chosen as the president for the simple fact that I was the only Nigeria amongst them and I also happened to be a lawyer.
So what is WRB all about? It is simply a platform created by clarion events to track legislative developments in emerging markets and see how to plug operators into the market opportunities.
What is the regulatory framework like in Nigeria? Generally it is perceived by some as weak or simply non-existent, the truth is that perception is subjective and it depends on where you are from but I must warn that there is no perfect framework anywhere in the world. The sufficiency of the framework of any jurisdiction can only be judged by its policy direction. Lets look at a few examples.
- As old as gaming has been in the US, online gaming was illegal for a very long time until about 4 years ago when 4 states legalized online gaming – in spite of expectations the rewards have not been quite encouraging making some other states adopt a wait and see stance before they legalize online gaming .
South Africa, which has been ahead of the curve in Africa also refrained from passing an online gaming law on public grounds; their thinking is that poverty will become more pervasive with online gaming.
What about Europe? Let’s look at German; at first it banned online gaming, which was against the European Unions’ constitution. The ban was as a result of an interstate treaty entered by its 16 provinces, however one of the provinces after a while opted out and decided to fully regulate online gaming.
So what is the policy consideration here in Nigeria? There is non-for now; it is simply perceived as source of revenue. Our legal framework is a work – in – progress like in other jurisdictions besides, technology has outpaced regulation and regulators are only trying to play catch-up. But regardless of the perception our framework has so far been able to sustain the aspirations of genuine operators.
In conclusion I will like to say that we expect a robust conference, all your comments, advise, suggestions will be collated and directed to the appropriate organizations for their consideration : we are positive that some of these would suggestions would have been implemented by this time next year.
Once again welcome and Good luck in your deliberations
Yahaya Maikori
President, Nigeria Gaming Association
Being the chairman’s opening address at the just concluded 1st World Regulatory Briefing Africa held on the 11th of April 2016 at 4 points Sheraton Lagos.
