Until very recently, pool staking and the ubiquitous lottery, popularly known as Baba Ijebu, were the popular gambling systems known to most Nigerians.

While pool staking, tied mainly to the different tiers of European football leagues, had been around for so long, long before young people even became sucked into the frenzy of supporting foreign football clubs, Baba Ijebu, only came onto the scene in the last decade or so.

But while the two processes can be regarded as the forerunners of gambling in Nigeria, there is a new system known widely as sports betting.

Like pool, it has to do with sports, hence the name; although, many Nigerians wrongly refer to it as Nairabet. Nairabet is just one of the registered and most popular companies that is active in the football betting business.

Known to have originated in North America and parts of Europe, sports betting are described as the activity of predicting sports results, especially football matches, and placing a wager on the outcome which is generally considered to be a form of gambling.

In the last three years or so, more Nigerians, especially from the age of 14 and 45, seem to have embraced sports betting, making it the most popular emerging form of sorts gambling in the country. Beyond Lagos State, sports betting are popular in most Nigerian cities and even rural areas, owing to the popularity of football and its huge following in the country which the form of gambling is tied to.

And with football fans who would rather support their teams for free, realizing that they can earn money from predicting scores, match results and others, it is spreading like a wildfire..

And like Sunday Bankole, an agent of 1960Bet, one of the popular outfits in the betting business and who runs Odejobi 01 unit at Odejobi Street, Agege, said, “there are several sports games like basketball, tennis, snooker, baseball, cricket and football to choose from, but football matches of European leagues, particularly the English Premier League (EPL), Spanish La Liga, Italian Serie A, as well as the ongoing FIFA World Cup and Nigerian Premier League excite Nigerians more.

Explain how the gambling/betting works, he said “there are different types of betting, you can predict scores if you like and you can predict a draw. If they give you first half draw, nothing concerns you with the second half since they have drawn the first half. But if any of them wins, it means you have lost.”

Asked how much most people pay for a wager, he said most go for the N100 wager since he started the business in the densely populated area of Lagos State last November. And the highest anyone has staked before in his outlet, the young man, who sounds fairly educated, said that N50,000 is the highest he has dealt with in his shop before, with a N30,000 wager coming next to that.

And regarding winnings, he said, “somebody has won N1 million, someone has won half a million, N300, 000 and so on through this shop.”

As an agent, he added that he is also allowed to bet since he cannot manipulate winning the process.

“Of course, I’m a football fan. I, personally, have placed a wager of like N5, 000 before. If I bet like N5, 000 and I win, I will be happy and will get my money.

He explained that one can stake online saying, “but, before you can play online you would have to create an account and attach your personal bank account.”

With online platforms of sports betting like , Goldenbetsng.com, , Nairastake.com, Footballpoolsxtra.com, Ladbrokes.com, 888sport.com/bet, Betconlony.com, Bet365Naija.com, 360bet.ng, 9japredict.com, mybet9ja.com, 1960bet.ng and many others, the coast of betting and gambling business in Nigeria is indeed growing by the day.

But with the internet and its technicality not something everyone is grounded in, in this clime, many of the companies, like Bakonle Managing Centres have made betting easy for those who computer illiterates.

Investigations by Saturday Independent reveal the agents can accept bets with deposits, pre-loaded cash cards and Interswitch cards and the markets for selling bets are open 24 hours of the day and seven days in a week. The agents do redeem winning tickets on behalf of the customer while the online customers on the other hand play via the internet platform, with payments and winnings made and claimed via online transactions.

The agents make profits through commissions on every game played at their centres each week and they can make as much as N70, 000 or N80, 000 in a week depending on the volume of transactions done through them.

To play, each team is assigned a different odd, which is what the players stake their bet on and such players have up to the kick-off time to bet their odds, either on the final score, draw, win, first to score, time of score and mode of score among others.

For each staker, the amount to be won is determined by the accuracy of the prediction and the amount staked on the odds, since the winner is usually determined by multiplying the odds and the amount.

The odd is the percentage given to every game in relation to its strength and are always in decimal forms like 1.00, 2.50 or 1.65 depending on the team and wager.

Seye Akanji who works with an advertising agency in Lagos but he is an ardent lover of football, said that the fact that Nigeria is a football loving nation is part of what is fueling the growth of sports betting, noting that it is a good development since fans are also making money from their passion.

On the risks involved, he said “anything can happen; even businesses can collapse. So, one cannot be too sure of anything.” He, however, advised people who wish to place bets to be well versed in whatever type of bet they want to place, in order to minimise the level of risk.

Nuhu Waheed, a trader who hails from the Kabba area of Kogi State, had this to say when asked why he thinks married women are getting involved in sports gambling even if it is legitimate: “Everybody wants money. Everybody would like to multiply the amount they have at hand and that is why married women play the game also.”

A young man who gave his name as Tiamiyu Alabi told us that he owns a centre at Grammar School Bus Stop close to Ojodu, a suburb of Lagos State where sports betting goes on. According to him, not only students and married women play the game, even police officers are involved.

Alabi recounted how a police officer at the Grammar School Police Station played a game and refused to pay him just because he did not win. Asked if people are allowed to play on credit, he said that was a peculiar case where he allowed the officer to play based on personal recognition.

According to the young man, “gone are the days when some sort of stigma is on gambling and gamblers. Most of those who engage are adults as well as a few of the elderly people. The act is now common with the youth of today especially as sports betting has made gambling more accessible and fashionable to the youth who now find it easier to place bets on premiership games and other leagues including La Liga and Seria A.”

For several jobless young people in Nigeria, sport betting and others including the popular Baba Ijebu has become sources of income.

A particular viewing center in the Ikosi area of Ketu, Lagos is always jam packed, with young boys flocking the location day and night to bet on games. A young man who introduced himself as Lukmon, revealed that boys just out of secondary school comprise a bulk of his customers.

“They just finished school and they haven’t entered university, so if they bet and they win, it is a fast way for them to make money before they enter school,” Lukmon said, in Yoruba. When he was informed that it is actually illegal to allow underage people to gamble, Lukmon became wary, thinking the reporter is a policeman.

But while several of the people Saturday Independent spoke to claimed that they have no data or evidence to prove it that internet fraudsters popularly known as yahoo boys are embracing sports betting, most of them agreed that most of the yahoo boys who are giving the country the bad image of a country of internet fraudsters may have embraced the emerging betting trend. What with the easy cash that can come based on predicting matches and placing wagers accurately. Cc. http://www.dailyindependent.ng


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