As the country reels under weight of betting by the youth, the Betting Control and Licensing Board has come out to ban the advertising of gambling.
According to a statement released by the board, they have banned the following;
- Outdoor advertising of gambling
- Advertising of gambling on all social media platforms
- Advertising of gambling between 6 am to 10 pm
- Endorsement of gambling operations by celebrities
The board described gambling as a demerit good that has a potential to harm the consumer with a possibility of leading to an addiction or disorder. Hence the need to protect the members of the public.
Moving forward, all forms of gambling advertisement has to be approved by the board and should contain a warning message about the consequences of gambling including addiction. Such a warning message must constitute a third of the actual advertisement and must be of the same font.
In my opinion, this amounts to closing the barn after the horse has bolted. This is because the harmful effects of gambling have been known since time immemorial. We actually wrote about the harmful effects of gambling back in 2016. It didn’t have to take people getting addicted and others dying for the government to act. However, it is a step in the right direction.