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{
    "id": 964433,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/964433/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 231,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Emuhaya, ANC",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Omboko Milemba",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13328,
        "legal_name": "Jeremiah Omboko Milemba",
        "slug": "jeremiah-omboko-milemba"
    },
    "content": "on Sports, Culture and Tourism for having come out very strongly at the right time to bring this Bill, which I must say is timely. Times have really changed. We are living in a situation where gambling is now part and parcel of not only the Kenyan society, but the global society. So, a law needs to be in place that can control and manage this, because it may also be very difficult to say that you are banning it. Banning it would mean that the entire activity will proceed in the underworld and that will not be good for anybody. So, this Bill is timely. The Bill repeals the BLG Act (Cap. 131) of 1966 for the control and licensing of betting, casinos and other forms of gambling. Again, this is very timely. The Act that we have been using on betting and gambling is a very old law. This Act of 1966 was certainly archaic. It could not handle the many changes that have occurred between 1966 and today. Therefore, this Bill, as I said earlier, is very timely. This Bill also gives an acceptance of the facts and the trends of the time that now we have the county governments. If we have several levels of government, then we have to give responsibility to all of them when handling gambling and betting. But I must be quick to say that the expectations of Kenyans when this Parliament is debating a Bill on betting and gambling is that we should have to bring measures in place which will ensure that if gambling is to go on, then it must be managed in a way that will not affect the students and children of this country so that they end up losing their lives because of the menace of gambling that is now in existence in every corner of the country. The other expectation of Kenyans is that this must be done in a controlled way that will not make the original understanding of casinos and gambling to be a dangerous game and, therefore, safeguard the security and monies that will be used and, even the people who will be going to these casinos. To that extent, this Bill tries to bring out that. I am happy because the Bill pulls down the edifice of gambling and tries to bring a new structure in this particular area of gambling and betting. This will be good in this century for this particular country. With regard to the main Bill, I want to appreciate the bringing onboard of the county governments because they are the ones who stay with the gamblers in the different counties. Bringing them on board will allow them to check who is licensed to do gambling business and who the legal practitioners in this field are. For me, that is very good because it will be a collective responsibility of the national Government and the county governments in controlling the betting and gambling that is now with us. The other thing I should talk about is the fines. The Act of 1966 gave a field day for gamblers in this country to pay fines and walk away. We notice that the fine was simply Kshs3,000 if you made any mistake on the issues of gambling and betting. But this law has made sure that the fines now go to the levels of modern day. So, it puts fines at between Kshs250,000 and Kshs2 million. Formerly, the fine was only between Kshs3,000 to Kshs10,000. You can imagine the amount of money the people involved in betting and gambling business were making and you are giving them a fine of Kshs10,000. They would pay that in the morning and continue breaking the law and moving forward. So, the Bill has addressed that. This is very good, so that betting can be controlled. The other issue is the distribution of funds and proceeds that will be realised from this. The Bill has introduced, in its Part X, a National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund that will help in the distribution of the funds that will be accruing, courtesy of lottery and betting. This is very good. How I wish later on, when we move to another stage of this Bill, we would see to it that this Fund also goes to help not only in rehabilitating those who would have been devastated by betting and gambling but also to help our people in sports because most of the betting and The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}