The entire process of living in Zimbabwe is somewhat of a risk at the moment, so you might imagine that there might be very little appetite for patronizing Zimbabwe’s casinos. Actually, it seems to be working the opposite way around, with the atrocious economic circumstances creating a bigger desire to gamble, to try and discover a quick win, a way out of the crisis.
For nearly all of the people subsisting on the abysmal nearby wages, there are two popular forms of gambling, the state lotto and Zimbet. As with most everywhere else in the world, there is a national lotto where the odds of winning are extremely small, but then the prizes are also extremely high. It’s been said by financial experts who look at the idea that the lion’s share do not purchase a card with the rational assumption of hitting. Zimbet is centered on one of the national or the English soccer divisions and involves predicting the results of future matches.
Zimbabwe’s gambling dens, on the other hand, pamper the extremely rich of the nation and vacationers. Up till recently, there was a very substantial tourist business, centered on safaris and visits to Victoria Falls. The market collapse and connected crime have carved into this market.
Amongst Zimbabwe’s gambling halls, there are 2 in the capital, Harare, the Carribea Bay Resort and Casino, which has 5 gaming tables and one armed bandits, and the Plumtree gambling hall, which has only slot machines. The Zambesi Valley Hotel and Entertainment Center in Kariba also has only one armed bandits. Mutare contains the Monclair Hotel and Casino and the Leopard Rock Hotel and Casino, the pair of which offer table games, slot machines and video poker machines, and Victoria Falls houses the Elephant Hills Hotel and Casino and the Makasa Sun Hotel and Casino, the two of which offer video poker machines and table games.
In addition to Zimbabwe’s gambling halls and the above mentioned lottery and Zimbet (which is quite like a pools system), there are also two horse racing tracks in the country: the Matabeleland Turf Club in Bulawayo (the second city) and the Borrowdale Park in Harare.
Seeing as that the market has contracted by more than forty percent in recent years and with the connected poverty and conflict that has resulted, it isn’t known how healthy the vacationing business which is the backbone of Zimbabwe’s gambling halls will do in the next few years. How many of them will be alive until things improve is basically unknown.