Lottery can fund Super Eagles World Cup campaign – Omaghomi

A stakeholder, David Omaghomi has advised the Federal government that proceeds from lottery funds is more than enough to bankroll Super Eagles campaign for the World Cup and generate enough revenue to effectively fund the development of sports in the country as it is been done in other climes.
Omaghomi , the chairman of National Union of Lottery Agents & Union made the call during a One-Day Public Forum on the Operations of the Lottery Industry in Nigeria at Abuja He gave examples of what some other countries like the United Kingdom have been able to do with sports lottery insisting that henceforth the story in Nigeria will not be different any more.
According to him, lottery proceeds is used to construct roads, build schools, hospitals and a lot of capital projects “Sports development as we all know is a very critical sector of the Nigerian society and so everything must be done to encourage it.
We have seen what countries like South Africa, England and Brazil did with lottery fund.
These countries successfully organized and hosted the World Cup and the Olympic Games.
If they can do it, we too can; we have a huge population that can generate a lot of resources of which a part of it will go to the National Lottery Trust Fund and of course fund our athletes which will be a big relieve to the government He called on government to be more transparent and honest and urgently addressed vices pertaining to the growth of the business in the country like youth addiction, under-age betting etc One of the participant, Mr.Bolaji Johnson highlighted the challenges facing the industry in the country to include, over-regulation, doubletaxation, religious factors, nonregulation of the sports betting and influx of illegal operators who are crippling the business in the country.
Speaking earlier, Chima Nwankwo ,chairman of the Lottery Operators Forum highlighted the high casuality rate and the unfriendly business environment with operators paying a license fee of N150m with other additional fees to be pay to the States.
“ We want to operate legally within the confines of the laws and not label a criminal.
We want a win-win situation .A level playing field where investors operators and all stakeholders will all smiles” he concluded.

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