About this app
What is Boo?
Petra’s journey to the role started in a hotel management school where she learned the ropes of hospitality, followed by a job at Transavia Airlines, a subsidiary of renowned Dutch operator KLM. This led to 24 years in the aviation industry, in a host of different roles: sales, marketing, operations – all aspects of the business that would later become useful in the casino industry.
By the time Covid came around in 2020, Petra felt she had done enough in aviation and went looking for her next role. As she told me, “Holland Casino popped up and I am somebody who by their nature looks at similarities instead of differences.
“What I saw is, Holland Casino is a company with 4,000 people working in hospitality, in a strongly regulated market where you have to balance between offering entertainment and a nice evening out with hospitality, and the risk attached to that – and there you see the similarities with the airline industry.
What is Boo?
The bill would increase the maximum sanction for contravening Section 87(1) to a P100,000 fine, imprisonment for up to five years, or both.
It would also require the Gambling Authority to give a licensee an opportunity to be heard before suspending, revoking or refusing to renew a licence.
Responsible gambling and treatment services were recurring themes in the parliamentary discussion.
About Boo
“At a break or at half time you see 10 to 20 [gambling] adverts,” he says. “It’s come to a point that oftentimes I even hear my kids singing [gambling adverts]. They’ll just keep asking, ‘But Daddy, what is this? What does this mean?’
“Our position is unequivocal. Betting is an adult activity. Operators must maintain effective age verification, marketing must not target or appeal to children and regulators; parents, schools and communities must reinforce the same message.”
As part of Africa Safer Gambling Week, the AiA has also focused on the illegal market, with Kesitilwe highlighting that offshore operators are harmful for player protection.
