Thailand's casino gamble
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Hi there, I'm Ed Butler and welcome to Business Daily here on the BBC World Service. Today you find me in a Buddhist temple in Thailand, south of the capital, Bangkok. People are burning incense, they're making offerings, they're shaking sticks to discover their fortune, lighting incense.

There are monks in orange robes around me. Now, one of the five precepts of Buddhism is no intoxication and no gambling. Many Thais take those precepts very seriously. Many, but not all. I wanted to play just for fun. That's how it began. And I would spend 50% of my salary on gambling, which was a lot. I couldn't manage my finances.

I won three times already. I like it very much because even poor people can become rich. Yes, even though many forms of it are illegal in Thailand, gambling has become a bit of a way of life for millions of Thais. And there are problems that come with that. So how are they feeling about government plans now to liberalise the industry? That's Business Daily here on the BBC. So I come here and I buy my ticket. Yeah.

Along with my fixer Mao, I've come to one of Bangkok's bustling markets to test my luck at one of the world's most popular national lotteries. The clicking noise is dozens of women stapling their remaining lottery tickets onto display boards. It's just hours left till the draw, which happens on the 1st and 16th of each month. The top prize, around US$180,000. US$180,000.

So I buy, basically, I spend 80 baht, which is about two or three dollars, and I buy a bunch of six digits. And essentially, these are just chosen on the ticket. I don't get to choose my own numbers. How do I get to, if I wanted to choose my own numbers, what would happen? If you want to choose your number, you can walk around in this market and look. Sometimes you can find it, sometimes you cannot find it.

So basically certain numbers run out? Yes, right. Certain popular number, favourite number run out. And what happens when they get in short supply? Does the price go up? Yes, the price will go up or sometimes they know it's likely to win the lottery. Some of the sellers just keep it for themselves.

How do they know it's going to win the lottery? It's random, isn't it? Yes, it's random, but you can say that which number is really popular. For example, Pope number. This is the number relating to the late Pope, who obviously died at a certain age, so maybe his age might be the lucky number this month. Yes, right, and it's already become like a lucky number, and some of them still following the number.

So everyone believes in there being their special lucky number? Yes, that's correct. High demand, high value, high price. Along with horse racing, the state's lottery is one of only a few types of gambling that's currently legal in Thailand. Perhaps that's why, despite the relatively low odds of winning, that more than 100 million tickets get sold every month. Mao and I approach one of the vendors.

I see you have a picture of a Buddhist monk there on the wall. Is that for good luck? More blessing and good luck. Yeah. It's not particularly Buddhist, this behaviour though, is it? I mean, I don't think they like this. Do they, officially? Oh.

Nothing to do with the bridges. It's about something that you want to take some risks. You want to have some fun on this one. Okay, a lady just coming past on her moped and buying a ticket. Do you buy every month, madam? Yes, every month, every 15 days.

How much do you like to spend on your tickets? She spends a lot of money because she also sells tickets as well. So you buy and you sell. That's interesting. Do you ever win? Yes, I won a lot. I won three times already. I won many times.

I like it very much because it's the day of your lucky day. And even poor people can become rich. And 24 hours later, we're heading to Lottery headquarters to find out whether this might be our lucky day.

So I'm looking at a podium now and various women in uniforms are holding up balls with numbers on them. They seem to have been doing this for hours and I find it utterly bewildering but all of these numbers represent some kind of a winning number, I guess.

and the first price is 854 685 and 042 285 i'm sorry you just missed the first price in thailand 109 which is not uh i haven't got that either 231 and 631 nope maybe next time

Well, when we were in there, when it was airing, there was a scream, an audible scream from the auditorium when the numbers were called. And I think we found the woman who was doing the screaming. She won. Yes. And I don't know what prize she doesn't want to say.

It seems like she won three digits for five tickets. So she would get about 20,000. 20,000 baht, that's $600. That's a big payday for some people, I guess. Yes, it depends how much you invest on it. It's an investment from poor people. Yes, from poor people because you don't have money for the big investment in stock market. You invest this for luck.

Well, as mentioned, the state lottery is a legal form of gambling in Thailand. An awful lot of other traditional Thai pastimes aren't. In Mae Sot, a town in the north of the country, there's regular illicit cockfighting. Crowds gathered at informal events like this, placing bets on which bird will emerge bloodied and victorious.

It's brutal, illegal and not to everyone's taste, but clearly popular with some locals, according to the cafe owner I met, who owns some of the fighting roosters.

We have events every week on Fridays and Saturdays here and in another town nearby. Mostly they come to gamble. Is that why they like it so much, the gambling? Yes, sometimes they can spend $30, some people bet up to $300. You see the jackpot keeps rising if there's no winner. It's usually very popular.

Gambling in Thailand takes many other forms too. Thanakorn Kamkris is Secretary-General of the country's Stop Gambling Foundation.

It's about 20 to 30 million people or more than 60% of Thai citizens in Thailand involved with gambling, mostly lottery, legal lottery. But second group is about people who've been upset with football. Football gambling is located somewhere close to a school or university and a young generation will be on this one.

And now they open an online casino game. Casino game is very new thing, but it's recognized as hard gambling and create lots of damage and make people addicted to the gambling. I'm 22 years old.

The Stop Gambling Foundation supports people like this man. He's one of a growing cohort of younger Thais who say they're struggling with addiction to online betting games. My name is Kai. Now I'm 22 years old.

How did I get into gambling? Well, it started with the people around me. Friends invited me to play and at that time I wanted to play just for fun. That's how it began. How addicted was I? Well, back then I was working part-time and I would spend 50% of my salary on gambling, which was a lot. Sometimes I won, sometimes I lost, but most of the time I lost more than I won. Problems I faced also affected the people around me.

My friends were concerned and kept warning me. I had a girlfriend at the time and we argued often because of this. I was actually gambling every day and that led to frequent arguments. Once you're addicted to gambling, you constantly feel the urge to keep playing. It's really hard to stop. I couldn't manage my finances. Every time I got money, it was all gone.

The foundation's own survey has found that some 700,000 Thai youths are now visiting illicit online gambling platforms and the number is steadily rising, betting on sports as well as casino games. You're listening to Business Daily from the BBC World Service.

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I'm Ed Butler and today I'm in Thailand looking at its legal and illegal gambling sector as the government looks to approve new casinos in the hope of attracting tourists, particularly from China.

Casinos generally are making a comeback across Southeast Asia. New complexes in the Philippines and Cambodia have sprung up. Malaysia has expanded its casinos. Singapore is extending its casino licences, all driven by the demand mostly of Chinese tourists who have limited access to gambling back home and more disposable income to travel. I visited one of Cambodia's border casinos just a few years ago.

Wow. This is a busy room. We've just walked in and it is heaving with people. This is the King Crown Casino. Crowds of people, lots and lots of groupiers in red jackets looking very smart. And a lot of rather ordinary looking Vietnamese people.

huddled over tables, playing cards, as though their life depends on it. Which, you never know, maybe it does. There's a variety of problems associated with these casinos, critics say, and not just their addictive qualities. The UN has linked them with money laundering, prostitution, scams...

and other forms of political corruption. So why then has Thailand decided to join the list of countries creating new casino complexes? The finance minister wouldn't talk to me about the government's plans, but General Tachai Pitanilaput, who runs the anti-human trafficking and online scam centre for the Royal Thai Police, told me that liberalising the country's existing gambling restrictions was overdue and would be good for the rule of law.

I'm a supporter of legalization. I think it's difficult to control the online gambling because it can set up any place in the world, around the world, any country. And then they can invite Thai people to join their activities. And it's not easy for the law enforcement authorities

to identify their whereabouts. And also, in some countries, online gambling is not illegal at all. Is online gambling itself becoming more of a challenge in Thailand? Absolutely, absolutely.

Is it connected to other criminality? I mean, are there connections? Yeah, to some extent. You know, some copyright violation, you know, sports. But I don't see any connection with illegal drugs, no, not yet. But money laundering maybe as well? Could be, could be. But having these big complexes, physical complexes in big cities like Bangkok or Chiang Mai or Phuket...

That will make it more transparent, the gambling? Absolutely. And you can tax them. You can control them. Easy, you know. But right now, how can you control not allowing children, young age, to play online gambling? How to educate them, you know? This is the way that many countries decided to legalize online gambling.

Well, despite those arguments, there is now a permanent anti-gambling protest outside the parliament building in Bangkok. A Buddhist monk here speaking against the new casino complexes. Many opposition MPs are also concerned. Rangsiman Rome is one of them. The government proposed an entertainment complex, like a special area, have casino inside.

have hotel, the hall for the concert, have a stadium. Health spa. Health spa. You know, can be everything that entertain. But the condition is must have casino inside. The proposal, as I understand it, involves four or five of these entertainment complexes, maybe one or two in the Bangkok area, one up in Chiang Mai in the north, Phuket maybe, that they will be in these big destinations. Yeah.

and that there will be a cash limit...

on the people who can go in. So an ordinary Thai needs whatever it is, a million, is it, you're saying 15 million baht, which is a lot of money. I mean, that's tens of thousands of dollars in their bank account before they can get in the door of that casino. It's true. So they, for the Thai people who want to go to the casino, that is the condition. But actually, we don't know yet where the casino will be. I mean, they say it's going to boost tourism, don't they?

Is it? Many countries, a lot of Thailand, they also have casino. Cambodia, they have casino. Vietnam, they have casino. Philippines, they have casino. Myanmar have casino. You don't think people go to Cambodia in order to go to the casinos? Well, now Thailand, we have the illegal casino already. Every big city, they already have a casino. Why people will go to Bangkok, to Thailand?

you know, play the casino. Why they not just go to the illegal casino? So what it mean? It mean if you own the business like Disneyland or Universal Studios, you cannot have in Thailand unless you have casino in Disneyland. Basically now it looks like the Thai government they want the casino more than the Disneyland, you know.

For me, it's really weird, you know, because we know that wherever that have the Disneyland is a lot of tourists there. You know, that is really clear for me. It boosts the tourism. But the casino, we have many competitors around Thailand. So, you know, it brings me the question that Thailand will end up like Cambodia, right?

or Laos or Myanmar. These are countries with a reputation for corruption and money laundering and all kinds of bad things associated with their casinos. Correct. What we feel is why the government have to make this really fast, why people cannot engage about this law more than this. So somehow people question about the transparency of this law. This law maybe can make this country have more problem

such as money laundering, the influence from the Chinese mafia. The Chinese mafia, they are the big boss of the problem in Thailand. So people feel like they feel unsafe. You know, they feel like their country will be under the influence of the Chinese mafia. You will be vulnerable to the mafia. So, I mean, do you share those concerns? Yeah, I share them. Many people are concerned about drug problem.

We also have the online gambling. And if you're looking at the corruption index, Thailand even now, even worse than Vietnam. In terms of the corruption? In terms of the corruption. So it makes me worry that, really, we are ready for that? I worry about the corruption. The government already deal with some company companies.

That could be in Macau, could be in Malaysia or even in Cambodia. We don't know about that. This law is due to pass in July, is that right? The first step. The first step. Do you think it will pass? I think the government may be not really easy to pass this law. And if they try to pass this law, I really worry that we're facing a lot of protests and, you know, the chaos will...

You think this really could destabilise Thailand? It could be. The opposition MP rang Simran Rome. Well, in a statement, the Thai government has said that the new proposed entertainment complexes, if approved, would increase revenue, support investment in Thailand and solve illegal gambling. It said they could boost the country's GDP by as much as 0.8 of 1%.

We'll keep you posted on the progress of their plans. But that's it for now. In tomorrow's Business Daily, we'll be continuing our series from Southeast Asia, looking at the growing trend of foreigners moving into retirement homes in Thailand. Could this be part of a long-term solution to elderly care worldwide, I wonder? Join us for that.

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