Joseph Semutooke
6 September 2008
analysis
Kampala — On a rather hot Saturday afternoon, on the top floor of the Mukwano Arcade down in Kampala's downtown business district, a horde of men jostles around a gigantic counter, handing in money to a young woman at the other end. Yet they are buying nothing.
In exchange for their money the young woman presents them with receipts bearing names of football clubs. They are placing bets and the receipts bear the names of football clubs and the amount they have bet on them.
Scattered on stools all around the spacious hall, away from the counter, more men (most of whom have placed bets) watch live football with their emotions more than with their eyes. Others crowd about a small noticeboard in a corner of the building, checking on previous results and matches yet to be played and animatedly exchanging news: "Torres is not going to play," or "Madrid has never won at Deportivo!"
Noticeably there is not a single woman in the packed hall. We have rushed headlong into the world of sports betting in Kampala. Only about two years ago, Uganda became the second African country after South Africa to legalise sports betting, and the phenomenon is winning fans as if it was offering miracle healing.
The country now has three specialized sports betting companies: Sports Bet Africa, Royal Sports Betting and Great Bet, while various casinos like Casino Simba have also installed sports betting sections.
You have seen those red-and white posters strewn all over the city bearing the initials SBA and screaming out: "You bet, We pay"? Or heard that advert on radio daring you to make lots of cash betting on your favourite football club? Well, if you haven't heeded the beckoning, don't rule out the possibility of your son or husband having been drawn in.
The betting houses register multitudes of punters whenever the West offers some sporting action. The betting is open to several sporting contests like boxing, cricket and rugby, but it is mainly betting on football that the soccer-mad Ugandans have taken to. The betting houses every weekend (and mid-week when there is Champions League action) avail a list of matches to be played in the
European leagues, with each possible match result allocated odds such that when a punter predicts a result correctly, he is paid his stake multiplied by that result's odds.
So this Saturday afternoon I choose to bet my sh5,000 on Arsenal beating Newcastle. But as I write down Arsenal in my notebook, an elderly gentleman at the counter (should be somewhere in his fifties) tells me I am going to lose and advises me to leave Arsenal alone.
"Putting your money on Arsenal?" he says. "You're finished. Better bet on another team and leave Arsenal alone until their injured stars are back and they are playing better."
I am surprised because I have not for asked his opinion or advice, but later I am to learn that it is the way of bettors to offer others advice even when it is unsolicited.
I also learn that the man's disfavour for Arsenal (which is the club he supports in the Premier League) is the result of their loss the previous weekend. It cost him sh400,000 as he had bet that they would beat Fulham.
The same punter is to reveal to me that he has been betting on football since his days in London in the early nineties. He explains that the odds are assigned to each possible result depending on its likelihood.
Today his choice, Liverpool beating Aston Villa, has odds of 1-7 because it is very likely, while that of Aston Villa winning has 2-1 because it is unlikely, and a draw 2-6 because it is always very hard to predict a draw between any two teams. I choose to bet my sh5,000 note on Arsenal winning (1-5 odds), though, because if I win this bet, I will be paid sh7,500. But my greatest doubts are whether people are really paid when they win.
"Only two weeks ago I won sh700,000 from sh50,000 when I jointly bet that Sunderland would beat Tottenham and Manchester City would beat West Ham," my new friend tells me when I ask if he has ever won and gotten paid.
"People are even paid millions!" At that point he introduces me to a plump young man who claims to have been paid sh3m from sh600 in January when he jointly predicted 10 correct winners on a single bet he refers to as a "soccer mix".
The young man even informs me that he had a picture of himself receiving the money in Bukedde, and that he used the money to start up a boutique in Wandegeya. But the two men warn me that almost all punters lose more than they win, and the older one confesses that he still bets only because he is sort of addicted.
"What these houses do is pay the few winners part of the collections from a day's total stakes, and the balance, the losers' money, goes to their pockets," he figures.
"Otherwise they would not be in business if people were winning more than they lose on their stakes."
"The trick of the game is to have as much knowledge about the different teams and leagues as possible," yet another punter I befriend informs me. "The bettors here ask that the results of the previous weekend and the most recent team news be pinned up on the noticeboard so they can get the knowledge necessary to make informed predictions. It is the secret to winning regularly."
I am also to overhear a trio exchange the esoteric news of how David Mugiri won't be playing for Lokomotiv Moskow this weekend, and how the Moscow club have not won at Sovetov, where they will be playing in an hour's time, in six years! I can only wonder at how many ardent followers of European football the culture is manufacturing. Sports journalists seem to enjoy a stature of prophets here, and I hear some men quote Joseph Kabuleta and Aldrine Nsubuga.
One young man comes in with the page bearing Mujib Kasule's predictions and follows it making his bets. It is two days later when I turn up to collect my sh7,500 (Arsenal won) that I get to know most punters lost their bets over the weekend, owing to the losses of such big teams as Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Juventus and AC Milan which are very popular with most punters. I also realise that my elderly friend of Saturday lost sh500,000 on the Liverpool bet.
When I engage the cashier, she informs me that there are weekends like that when the casino gets to keep almost all the bets collected, and others when the punters win large. Though she whispers some advice to me: she says I should always bet low sums that won't hurt my pockets badly, and warns me that there are people who lost their children's school fees and house rent betting on sports.
As I walk out of the betting premises I can only wonder how many people are now trying to make a quick buck over 90 minutes of football, and I begin to see why more betting houses and more branches of existing ones are opening up in Kampala. And I can't avoid thinking that betting on chicken-fighting and street fights should be on their way.
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