A 29-year-old businessman has been sentenced to nine months for operating a gambling game without a license.
The convict, Isaac Eyison, was sentenced by the Assin Fosu District Court in the Central Region.
Mr. Eyison pleaded guilty to the charges of illegal gaming in public.
The gambling game which is a game of pure chance requires no strategy to give players advantages, the outcome is determined by randomness.
The Prosecutor, Chief Inspector Gilbert Ayongo, told the court presided over by Abdul Majeed Illiasu that the convict was arrested due to intensified police patrols to clamp down on some festering illegal activities in the Fosu Municipality.
“On Sunday, June 6, at about 08:30 hours, the police in Assin-Fosu gathered intelligence about the illegal gaming activities of the convict, which had attracted high patronage.”
“Thereafter, a police patrol team led by Chief Inspector Johnson Dzikunu quickly moved to the scene but many patrons and bystanders took to their heels on seeing the police,” Mr. Ayongo told the court.
He added that the police managed to arrest the convict and retrieved from him three mobile phones, wristwatches, spectacles, five pieces of black square-shaped wood tied with a black rubber band, and GH₵510.00 cash.
Upon pleading guilty to charges against him in court, the convict failed to produce a license or any document of authority to back his illegal gaming activities.
In March 2022, the Gaming Commission of Ghana (GCG), the regulators of the game of chance in the country called on operators of analogue slot machines (jackpots) to voluntarily surrender their machines to the Commission.
The call followed the Commission’s nationwide exercise to clamp down on illegal gambling machines. Operators of the machines have exhausted a two-year moratorium to transition to digital gaming platforms to conform to international standards of play and to protect minors from exploitation.
The transition to digital gaming systems would also enable the Commission to verify customers and users and keep records of gaming transactions in compliance with the Anti-Money Laundering Act, 2020 (Act 1044).
To this end, the Commission on Friday, March 25, 2020, embarked on an operation that led to the confiscation of about 28 jackpot machines in the Kasoa area of the Central region.
The operation was carried out simultaneously across the country.
Ms Beatrice Baidoo, the Public Affairs Manager of the Commission, urged illegal jackpot operators to voluntarily hand over their slot machines to the GCG and go through the required processes to acquire digital ones to avert arrest and sanctions.
Beyond the confiscation of the machines, she said the Commission had engaged operators who had legally registered with them to assist with the specifications and acquisition of the digital machines.
“We have told the operators the specifications for the digital machines, so if you want to operate any form of the digital gaming machine, come to the Commission, apply through the right processes and have your game on.”
Ms Baidoo appealed to the public to volunteer information on the operations of the illegal jackpot operators to enable the Commission to enforce the ban.
Also, more than 95 per cent of the gaming machines belonged to Chinese nationals, who were not at the gaming centres during the operation.
Apart from the Chinese, all other jackpot machines seized at drinking spots were managed by Ghanaians, mostly youth, who said it was their source of livelihood.
In 2018, the Gaming Commission issued a notice to all gaming operators on its intention to phase out analogue and non-digital jackpots within the gaming landscape in the country.
The directive formed part of the Commission’s effort to upgrade the industry to meet international best practices, protect minors and curb the exploitation of the vulnerable.
The Commission is working with other government agencies including the Local Government Service and District Assemblies to ensure that the business operating permits were not issued to illegal gaming operators.