{"id":19134,"date":"2026-02-27T23:11:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T02:11:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/?p=19134"},"modified":"2026-04-19T08:23:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T11:23:15","slug":"botswana-gambling-authority-warns-against-paid-betting-lessons-and-mentorship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/botswana-gambling-authority-warns-against-paid-betting-lessons-and-mentorship","title":{"rendered":"Botswana gambling authority warns against paid betting lessons and mentorship"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Since gambling is mainly a game of chance, structured training for players cannot be licensed, making any commercial provision of such lessons unlawful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Botswana.- The Gambling Authority of Botswana<\/strong> has issued a public notice to counter misleading claims on social media about whether private gambling education and consultation fall under the Gambling Act<\/strong>. The regulator said it had \u201cnoted with concern misleading information shared with the public on social media relating to \u2018The Jurisdictional Limits of the Gambling Act regarding Private Education and Consultation\u2019<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The notice was issued in response to a column by Mmapope Galeboe<\/strong> with the same title, which has circulated widely on social media and raised questions about whether individuals can legally offer paid training, lessons or mentorship for gambling activities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Authority clarified that under Section 5 of the Gambling Act,<\/strong> 2012<\/strong>, it is mandated to regulate and control gambling establishments and to take all necessary actions to carry out its functions. This includes overseeing the gambling market to ensure compliance with the Act and its regulations, enforcing the law in cases of non-compliance and regulating commercial gambling-related services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The regulator stated that licensing or registration is required under Sections 97 and 102<\/strong> for anyone providing gambling-related services. However, because gambling is mainly a game of chance, structured training or lessons for players are unnecessary and cannot be licensed, making any commercial provision of such lessons unlawful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It explained that training or educational activities within the gambling industry are permitted only when they relate to skills or competency development for employees, and must be carried out by service providers that are properly registered or licensed and assessed in line with the Gambling Act and regulations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Authority warned that gambling training programmes, betting lessons, mentorship schemes and similar services are unlawful under the Gambling Regulations 2016<\/strong>, and that both providers and participants may face fines of up to P5,000<\/strong> (\u20ac310), imprisonment of up to six months<\/strong> or both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The notice concluded by advising the public to obtain information on how licensed gambling games operate directly from licensed operators, who are legally obliged to provide the rules for each game they offer.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n\t\t\tSee also:<\/span><\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tSee also:<\/span> Angola\u2019s Gambling Authority cracks down on raffles with 30-day approval rule<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Since gambling is mainly a game of chance, structured training for players cannot be licensed, making any commercial provision of such lessons unlawful.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2395,"featured_media":15013,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"The Gambling Authority of Botswana has issued a public notice clarifying that the commercial provision of \"gambling education\" or \"betting lessons\" for players is unlawful under the Gambling Act, 2012, and Gambling Regulations 2016. This action counters misleading social media claims, emphasizing that only employee-focused training by properly licensed providers is permitted, with penalties for non-compliance.","focusai_entities":"Gambling Authority of Botswana, Mmapope Galeboe","focusai_location":"Botswana","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.8), investor_analyst (0.7), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Regulatory Scope Expansion?","query":"How might this clarification by the Gambling Authority of Botswana influence the regulatory approach to other nascent or ambiguous gambling-related services, such as AI-driven betting advice or predictive analytics tools?"},{"label":"Operator Compliance Impact?","query":"What specific due diligence measures should licensed operators implement to ensure their marketing affiliates or third-party partners are not inadvertently promoting or linking to these newly clarified unlawful \"gambling education\" services?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[60014,60023],"tags":[71,60138,60033],"class_list":["post-19134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-central-africa","category-legal-news","tag-gambling","tag-legislation","tag-regulation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2395"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19134"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19196,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19134\/revisions\/19196"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}