The prospect of living in Zimbabwe is somewhat of a risk at the current time, so you might think that there might be little desire for patronizing Zimbabwe’s gambling halls. Actually, it seems to be operating the opposite way around, with the awful market circumstances creating a higher desire to wager, to try and locate a quick win, a way from the crisis.
For the majority of the citizens living on the tiny local money, there are two popular types of gambling, the national lottery and Zimbet. Just as with most everywhere else in the world, there is a state lotto where the odds of profiting are unbelievably tiny, but then the jackpots are also very high. It’s been said by economists who look at the situation that many do not purchase a card with the rational expectation of profiting. Zimbet is founded on one of the national or the English football divisions and involves determining the outcomes of future games.
Zimbabwe’s gambling halls, on the other shoe, cater to the incredibly rich of the country and vacationers. Up until a short while ago, there was a considerably big vacationing business, centered on safaris and trips to Victoria Falls. The economic collapse and associated violence have carved into this market.
Amongst Zimbabwe’s gambling dens, there are two in the capital, Harare, the Carribea Bay Resort and Casino, which has five gaming tables and one armed bandits, and the Plumtree gambling den, which has just the slot machines. The Zambesi Valley Hotel and Entertainment Center in Kariba also has just one armed bandits. Mutare contains the Monclair Hotel and Casino and the Leopard Rock Hotel and Casino, the two of which offer gaming tables, one armed bandits and electronic poker machines, and Victoria Falls houses the Elephant Hills Hotel and Casino and the Makasa Sun Hotel and Casino, both of which have gaming machines and table games.
In addition to Zimbabwe’s gambling dens and the aforestated alluded to lottery and Zimbet (which is very like a parimutuel betting system), there are a total of two horse racing tracks in the country: the Matabeleland Turf Club in Bulawayo (the second metropolis) and the Borrowdale Park in Harare.
Seeing as that the market has contracted by beyond 40% in recent years and with the connected poverty and conflict that has come to pass, it is not understood how well the sightseeing industry which funds Zimbabwe’s casinos will do in the next few years. How many of the casinos will survive till things improve is merely not known.
