Friday’s Business Day front page carried some significant news: the department of trade, industry & competition is actively working to tighten gambling advertising regulations.
The update has been brewing at the department, which made clear in the latter half of last year that it would not turn its head away from socioeconomic damage wrought by the explosion of sports betting and online casinos.
The focus on advertising reflects a sentiment we all intuitively feel. Gambling promotion has become untenable. It has penetrated every facet of society; weevilled into every orifice of daily life. TV, radio, news sites, social media, billboards, buildings, urinals, sports games … it is inescapable.
It is too much — that is one thing most of us can agree on. That appears to be the department’s departure point too.
“We will also be responding with norms and standards to curb the extent of gambling advertising,” director-general Simphiwe Hamilton said in a formal response to Rise Mzansi’s 2025 memorandum. (The party has made a tightening of gambling regulations a policy priority).
“Curb” and “extent” are wonderful government words with open-ended meanings. A commitment to do something without really committing to do anything. With the amount of money and vested interests involved, a hedging of bets — and a little pussyfooting — was to be expected.
The DA has long accused the ANC of dragging its feet on the gambling issue. Its own critics have in turn highlighted the party’s connections to Martin Moshal, the venture capitalist believed to be effectively driving Betway. In addition to the DA, Moshal is a large funder of ActionSA and Build One SA.
Dewald van Rensburg put it succinctly in his amaBhungane investigation in July: “While there is no evidence Moshal, who lives abroad, has lobbied for regulatory favours, the DA has promoted a highly problematic Remote Gambling Bill, and Moshal’s generosity raises at the very least the perception of potential influence.”
Still, the mere fact that this issue is on the agenda — with a self-imposed deadline of July — is big news, with the ramifications limited only by our imaginations. They begin with the definition of advertising. To what “extent” will it encompass sponsorship? We can only wonder whether the Sharks rugby franchise, already God’s forsaken people, will be in the market for a new backer. Ditto for countless other teams, to say nothing of entire leagues and events such as the Premier Soccer League and Durban July.
Are we talking only about public spaces? Or will this extend not just to print advertising but also targeted online promotions? A presentation by the National Gambling Board to the department in October gave a hint on some of these questions. It mentioned age gating and reducing unintentional viewing ― which would necessitate, for example, designated airing hours for television campaigns.
Regardless of the eventual answers to these questions, advertising is a good place to start to address a complex issue, and it is certainly more creative than slapping on some sin taxes and going home.
No sensible person should be calling for the outright prohibition of gambling either. A liberal society demands that an adult should and must be left to make their own decisions. As history has routinely taught us, paternalism is rarely effective.
It is almost axiomatic that the target should be the lifestyle advertising sells so well; it is where the most pernicious effects of gambling stem from. Teenagers are sucked into the high-roller fascination long before they’re old enough to enter a casino; struggling parents are persuaded that one good parlay will get them out of debt; and it is all sold on the promise that these futures are just a click away on a smartphone.
We now have incontrovertible evidence of the effectiveness of the ban on cigarette advertising, at least when it comes to luring in new users.
That industry, too, sold a dream: to pose in a Jeep for an outdoor magazine or ski with European elites. Killing the fantasy is remarkably effective.
• Feltham is Business Day editor-in-chief.