Part 2: The curious case of Brazilian bingo
were being diverted to corrupt
government officials, from federal to
municipal levels.
A Parliamentary
Commission of Inquiry
(the CPI dos Bingos)
found that criminals
were using bingo halls
to launder money and
that proceeds were
being diverted to corrupt
government officials,
from federal to
municipal levels
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What went wrong?
The University of Kent report makes
the obvious point that the regulatory
framework for bingo “lacked a robust
articulation of objectives, instruments,
and methods”. It stated that the
regulatory process “developed in a
slow, piecemeal fashion”.
“It relied from the outset on
heroic, unrealistic assumptions
about the ability of sports
organisations to diversify into the
provision of gambling services such
BRAZIL The regulated opportunity in Latam’s largest market
as bingo, and about the capacity of
new and inexperienced institutions
to regulate the country’s only formal
market for non-state provision of
mass-market gambling.”
The exacting standards for each
establishment, requiring substantial
investment in facilities, were beyond
the sports organisations it was
intended to encourage.
However, the status of bingo as the
only legal and commercially available
game made it attractive to organised
crime organisations, which had been
running the illegal but very popular
jogo do bicho lottery-style game.
Crime organisations ended up