The proposed national lottery is likely to prove hugely popular with South Africans and could benefit NGOs. Evidence wa ka Ngobeni reports
Millions of people, and needy organisations, could soon benefit from the first South African national lottery, which is expected to contribute hundreds of rands to government budgets, as well as generating billions of rands in sales each year.
The national lottery is also expected to provide hundreds of jobs, improve the country’s economy and pump billions into needy organisations in the country.
The South African NGO Coalition (Sangoco), which represents hundreds of NGOs across the country, has welcomed the possibility of lottery money.
“NGOs are forced to cut down on their operations and staff due to financial constraints, and we see the lottery as an opportunity for funding,” says Sangoco’s representative, Eugene Saldanha.
Saldanha said his organisation is currently setting up policies for the distribution of the lottery money.
“We want to make sure that the policy that governs the distribution of lottery money is equitable,” says Saldanha.
The national lottery, which will generally offer instant scratch-off tickets and online games to the public, is expected to generate sales of more than R5-billion each year.
Half of the national lottery’s total takings will go to prizes. Most of the rest will be allocated to welfare, upliftment and development projects.
After profits, costs and winnings, there would be 30% left for good causes. Half of the “good cause money” will be given to the National Development Agency for reconstruction programmes and the other half divided between welfare, sport development, arts, culture and natural heritage.
The national lottery scratch-off tickets or online games will cost about R5 to R10.
The national lottery, if implemented, is likely to be hugely popular with the majority of South Africans and the government, but critics say it could encourage fraud and corruption.
In the United States, lotteries were banned at the end of the 19th century following a bribery scandal in the Louisiana lottery. Yet there are more than 165 national lotteries currently operating around the world.
The Department of Trade and Industry is currently reviewing three bidders keen to run the lottery. The department is to grant the country’s first national lottery licence by April this year.
The national lottery is expected to start operating by October 1999.
“The national lotteries will be closely monitored. There will be no fraud or corruption, and the tickets will be cheap,” says trade and industry representative Themba Rabushe.
The lottery board will also monitor the nature of the lottery games that will be offered by the prospective operator.
Rabushe, who believes public participation in the lottery will determine its success, says specific organisations to receive the lottery money had not yet been identified.
“We are not going to give organisations money to play with. Organisations will be given money for instance to buy equipment, and we want to see the receipts,” he says.
Rabushe says the public will make submissions to the government on which organisations should receive the lottery money. The government will then nominate the organisations to receive it.
A separate national lottery distribution trust fund will be put in place to distribute billions of rands, Rabushe says.
“The lottery money will be used to help areas struck by disaster,” adds Rabushe. The disaster fund is currently under financial constraints.
The national lottery, if implemented, also promises to provide employment to hundreds of retailers across the country. The retailers will operate the lottery terminals, sell tickets to the public and validate winning tickets using online terminals.
It is expected that within the first two weeks of operation, some lucky individuals will have won more than R100-million in cash prizes. The bidders for the national lottery licence expect that 45 lottery millionaires will be produced each year.