The prospect of living in Zimbabwe is something of a risk at the moment, so you could think that there might be very little appetite for visiting Zimbabwe’s gambling halls. Actually, it seems to be operating the opposite way, with the atrocious market conditions leading to a larger ambition to gamble, to attempt to locate a fast win, a way out of the situation.
For the majority of the locals subsisting on the meager local earnings, there are two common styles of betting, the national lotto and Zimbet. As with practically everywhere else on the planet, there is a national lottery where the probabilities of winning are unbelievably tiny, but then the jackpots are also very big. It’s been said by financial experts who look at the idea that many don’t buy a ticket with the rational assumption of winning. Zimbet is based on either the domestic or the British soccer divisions and involves determining the outcomes of future matches.
Zimbabwe’s gambling dens, on the other shoe, pamper the considerably rich of the nation and tourists. Up till not long ago, there was a exceptionally large sightseeing business, centered on safaris and visits to Victoria Falls. The market woes and connected violence have cut into this market.
Among Zimbabwe’s casinos, there are 2 in the capital, Harare, the Carribea Bay Resort and Casino, which has 5 gaming tables and slots, and the Plumtree gambling hall, which has just the slots. The Zambesi Valley Hotel and Entertainment Center in Kariba also has only slot machines. Mutare has the Monclair Hotel and Casino and the Leopard Rock Hotel and Casino, both of which have gaming tables, slot machines and video poker machines, and Victoria Falls has the Elephant Hills Hotel and Casino and the Makasa Sun Hotel and Casino, both of which have slot machines and tables.
In addition to Zimbabwe’s gambling dens and the previously alluded to lottery and Zimbet (which is very like a parimutuel betting system), there is a total of two horse racing complexes in the nation: the Matabeleland Turf Club in Bulawayo (the 2nd metropolis) and the Borrowdale Park in Harare.
Given that the market has deflated by more than 40 percent in the past few years and with the connected deprivation and violence that has come about, it isn’t known how healthy the sightseeing industry which supports Zimbabwe’s casinos will do in the near future. How many of the casinos will carry on until things get better is simply not known.