Of Kenya and the Betting Problem

I don’t bet. It is a personal choice, just as I am not a fanatical soccer fan etc. But here is the thing, betting, just like being a fan of sport is a passion and/or leisure activity which you are not going to deny people from enjoying and still expect to look good. Government of Kenya (GoK) is looking really bad in its attempt to prohibit people from betting. You see. This is part of the bigger problem. A lot of people in Kenya, especially the youth, are not gainfully engaged hence have no meaningful and/or reliable sources of income. This life situation has turned many of them into betting as a source of income and/or livelihood as opposed to engaging in it as a leisurely activity that it should be. The GoK has no business banning betting, in fact, it should be busy collecting revenue. On the contrary, GoK should be preoccupied with addressing factors that make its citizens turn into betting as a source of income and/or livelihood. Because that is where the actual problem is. Establish an environment where a majority of the people of Kenya, particularly the youth, can be engaged in meaningful and gainful economic ventures and betting will naturally stop being a big social problem. As simple as that. But we have a government that is clueless, always engaged in waging wrong battles and so it looks bad because it is a bad and inept government always busy attending to wrong things and/or right things in a wrong way.