Betting, gaming and a generation at risk

The world has entered an era where it is increasingly difficult to tell an underage child from an adult. Children dress older, act older, and, more dangerously, are exposed earlier to adult vices. In Nigeria today, one of the clearest manifestations of this blurred boundary is the explosive spread of betting and gaming culture, which has quietly seeped into schools, streets and smartphones, reshaping how many young people think about work, success and the future. To some elderly Nigerians, it is like when luck replaces labour.

Recent projections that Africa’s gaming industry could reach $28 billion within the next decade have been greeted with excitement by investors and policymakers. Conferences celebrate Lagos as the next frontier for global gaming content. Panels discuss studios, intellectual property, mobile platforms and diaspora markets. All of this signals opportunity. Beneath the optimism lies an uncomfortable contradiction. While a small segment of young Nigerians are being encouraged to build games as creators and professionals, a far larger number are being pulled into betting and chance-based gaming as consumers, often underage, largely unregulated, and increasingly detached from the values of discipline and productive labour.

Read also: Nigeria Sees Surge in Online Betting Sign-ups Ahead of 2026: Regulators and Operators Brace for Growth

On one hand, gaming as a creative industry holds promise. With Africa’s market projected at about $11 billion and sub-Saharan Africa growing at roughly 25 per cent yearly, the numbers are compelling. Mobile-first populations, diaspora demand and the global success of African cultural exports such as Afrobeats and Nollywood suggest that Nigerian-made games could travel far beyond local borders. Industry leaders rightly argue that with training, funding and patient capital, gaming studios could create jobs, export intellectual property and generate sustainable value.

On the other hand, what dominates the streets is not game development but betting shops. Brightly lit kiosks sit beside schools and motor parks. Aggressive online advertising floods social media timelines, promising instant riches from a few clicks. Football betting odds scroll endlessly on phones, often in the hands of teenagers who can barely prove their age. In a country battling unemployment, inflation and shrinking opportunities, betting has been repackaged as hope.

For many young Nigerians, especially those without access to quality education or skills training, betting and chance-based gaming subtly redefine ambition. The message is simple and seductive: you do not need to become a serious worker, apprentice or professional; you only need luck. Why endure years of training when a single ‘correct score’ can change your life overnight? Why hustle in a collapsing economy when a jackpot promises escape?

The implications are clear, and the first is the erosion of the work ethic. Societies grow when effort, skill and persistence are rewarded. Betting culture, by contrast, normalises waiting (waiting for odds, waiting for results, waiting for luck). It breeds passivity in a generation that should be building, experimenting and learning.

“The ideal situation demands deliberate intervention, as regulation must catch up with reality. Nigeria cannot continue to allow betting operators to flourish unchecked while paying lip service to age limits.”

Second is the exposure of underage children to addictive behaviour. In Nigeria, enforcement of age restrictions is weak at best. Betting platforms rarely require rigorous verification. Physical betting shops often turn a blind eye. The result is early addiction, distorted risk perception and, in some cases, petty crime to sustain betting habits. When children learn to equate money with chance rather than value creation, the social cost compounds over time.

Third is economic leakage. While gaming studios aim to create local intellectual property, much of the betting ecosystem funnels money outward (to foreign-owned platforms, licensing fees and offshore operators). Instead of circulating within communities through jobs and innovation, scarce household income is drained through losses that disproportionately affect the poor.

This is not an argument against gaming as an industry. It is an argument against the failure to distinguish clearly between productive gaming and predatory betting. Game development requires training, discipline, teamwork and long-term thinking. Betting requires none of these, only money and hope. Lumping both under the same celebratory narrative of ‘gaming growth’ is misleading and dangerous.

The ideal situation demands deliberate intervention, as regulation must catch up with reality. Nigeria cannot continue to allow betting operators to flourish unchecked while paying lip service to age limits. Enforcement should be strict, visible and punitive. Advertising must be restricted, especially during sports broadcasts and on platforms heavily used by minors.

Read also: Why does South Africa continue to be a popular destination for online betting?

Also, policy must actively redirect youth energy from consumption to creation. If Africa’s gaming industry is truly a $28 billion opportunity, then investment in training should start early. Structured programmes in schools, technical colleges and hubs can teach coding, design, storytelling and animation, i.e., turning gaming from a gamble into a profession.

Likewise, public messaging must change. Governments, educators and influencers should stop glamourising sudden wealth narratives and instead highlight the real stories behind success: years of learning, failure and persistence. Betting should be treated like alcohol: legal for adults, regulated, and clearly communicated as risky, not aspirational.

Similarly, parents and communities must reclaim their role. In an era where underage and adult lives blur, silence is complicity. Conversations about money, work and risk cannot be outsourced to betting apps and social media systems.

Gaming can either become another extractive industry that feeds on youthful desperation or a creative engine that rewards skill and imagination. The difference lies in policy choices, cultural choices and moral choices. A society that teaches its children to wait for luck instead of building valuable mortgages for its future. And that is a gamble Nigeria can hardly afford.

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