It’s a day after salaries were paid in Ghana’s capital, Accra, and a police officer is scanning through the city as if there has been a robbery.
He navigates his car through the heavy traffic that the overcrowded city has become known for, and murmurs the words, “I need to stop this,” as he sweats profusely, despite the car’s air conditioning being fully on.
He arrives at one destination, then moves to another, hoping for some good luck or a hint to apprehend these non-existent robbers.
Fortunately, for Accra folks, there was no robbery in the capital. Unfortunately for him, he’s just robbed himself of his hard-earned insufficient salary and his family’s daily bread for the month.
This police officer has just gambled his entire salary away, barely 24 hours after he received that smile-inducing bank alert. He’s lost everything.
Every single cedi to Aviator – an online game where bettors wager on a moving plane, and hope to cash out before it flies away.
“What will I tell my wife and kid?” He quizzes.
He breathes heavily and scrolls through his contact list. Who will be his saviour this month? Not the loan facility available for the security service. He’s been cautioned not to show up there again after taking too many loans that he’s yet to repay.
Grave mistake
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But how did he even get here in the first place?
He opens up to Pulse Ghana’s Mandela Yaw Anuvabe…
I was not introduced, it was something I saw somebody, a colleague officer, doing on his phone. So, I thought he was using that application that you use to boost your phone so that it can run fast or work fast. Later, when I drew closer, it wasn’t that app. [It was] this Aviator app.
As the saying goes, curiosity kills the cat, except that this time curiosity is about to ruin the life of a police officer. This was early 2023.
New to gambling and largely ignorant about sports betting, he was simply fascinated by the Aviator game. That same night, he started betting with small amounts of money, but he already got the feeling that “the house always wins.”
Instead of stopping there, he increased his wages after seeing others cash out huge amounts of money on the same app. Pressured, he followed suit.
He brushed away several warnings, thinking he had it under control.
Some of my colleagues who got to know that I am into that were warning me that I should stop, but I knew that I had it under control. So, it’s not something that will overcome me or something I’ll get addicted to, or something that I will spend so much into it. No. So myself, I think I had it under control, knowing that I was only betting a little amount.
Slow poison
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But, betting addiction doesn’t work like that. The Medical Director and Clinical Psychologist for the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA), and Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the Ghana Psychological Association, Doctor Isaac Newman Arthur, explains:
Yeah, so, there are two basic types of addictions. We have substance-related addictions. So, we have marijuana, cocaine, we have alcohol, and those other things. Then we have behavioral addictions. So that one, we may look at addictions to pornography, masturbation, addiction to gambling, or betting.
So, sports betting addiction is also another type of addiction, when you look at addictions, because they all interfere with the communication pathways of the brain. There are pathways of the brain for reward, for pleasure, for excitement.
He adds that gambling addiction is a tricky form of addiction that attacks the communication aspect of the human brain.
Sports betting, and all these bets and gambling actually work on the brain as though you are on marijuana or cocaine. They all interfere with the communication pathways of the brain.
As time went by, the police officer slowly started getting addicted as his brain’s communication was tweaked. He admits:
When I realized that I had lost much and was trying to chase my losses. So, that made me bet more. And more especially because my salary account is linked to mobile money, so I could [deposit] a bigger amount directly onto my mobile money account and transmit it or move it into the betting account for that bet.
Fighting the thrill
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The thrill of winning huge and potential rewards pushed him deep into the abyss of betting addiction. This, Doctor Arthur says, is common with betting addiction.
The feeling that you’re achieving, the feeling that you are succeeding or you will succeed, that anticipation actually makes you want to do it again and again.
The thrill was getting intense, and this police officer was gradually losing it all. In less than a year, this same person who started betting with as little as 10 pesewas began losing his entire salary to Aviator. He recalls with a trembling voice one of such days.
Yes. Yes. One day, I lost GH₵3000 overnight. The salary that I waited for a whole 30 days with so much endurance before it came… less than 24 hours, I lost it all. And I was left with nothing.
Nothing for his family to feed on for an entire month. He couldn’t believe his eyes, so he went back to the app to clarify if this was a nightmare.
And I began to ask myself, ‘What is this?’ And I can’t help myself too. Meanwhile, I’m not even alone. I have a wife and a child that I’m taking care of. I lost it. When I get back to the app, there’s nothing I can do about it.
His voice still quivering, he laments:
It’s gone. It’s gone.
Dreams and nightmares
No. This wasn’t a nightmare. His salary, part of which had already been used to clear loans he took to bet, had just vanished in a few minutes. It flew away in seconds just like the Aviator plane.
This led to his Accra escapade. Scanning the busy city looking for an escape. A loan from anywhere to survive the month with his family. A few stops here and there, with nothing to show for. Calls to colleagues, friends, and acquaintances in search of a way out.
No help was in sight. All was lost, and it looked like his family had to fast for an entire month.
Finally, a good Samaritan who works at a microfinance offered him a loan.
He used to be someone scared of taking loans, but betting took that phobia away.
Faulty moral compass
He’s also a pastor, but betting made him go against his morals. Betting addiction, according to Dr. Arthur, has nothing to do with one’s social standing or moral allegiance.
Final confession
It’s easily accessible on their mobile devices and communities with shops littered across the country.
The pastor confesses:
Addict turned advocate
Escaping the abyss
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