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The South African province of Western Cape said it will lobby the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC) and the national parliament to “expedite” a bill to fully regulate online gambling.
In its 2025/2026 budget, Western Cape said the pending Remote Gambling Bill will “protect our residents against the harms of the industry, and for the corresponding taxation to flow to provinces”.
Gambling tax revenue is already set to grow in the province, mainly due to an increase in online betting on sports and other games.
Tax revenue is projected to grow at an annual average growth rate of 22.1 percent from the 2024/25 revised estimate to 2027/28.
With the rapid increase of online sports betting, the Western Cape Gambling and Racing Board will receive R25.4m over the medium-term expenditure framework (MTEF) to “enable it to collect more than R3bn in taxes over the MTEF for the province”.
Casino taxes are expected to grow at an AAGR of 3.0 percent over the same period.
Gambling taxes account for 29.9 percent of the province's total tax income.
Next Steps For National Bill
The Remote Gambling Bill, which would regulate online gambling in the country, is sponsored by the Democratic Alliance (DA) Party’s national spokesperson on trade, industry and competition, Toby Chance MP.
Chance revived the bill last year, but recently told Vixio GamblingCompliance that it “is still waiting to be tabled before the DTIC Portfolio Committee”.
A separate National Gambling Amendment Bill is awaiting the formation of parliament's Mediation Committee, where it will be discussed, but there is no timeline for when it will be formed.
Although online gambling is prohibited at the federal level, licences for online betting are available and are issued by the provincial licensing authorities of Western Cape and other provinces.
In addition, live dealer casino games have been permitted as “contingent events” for betting within the Western Cape and Mpumalanga for several years, while more casino game types, including slots-style games, have been approved in recent years.
In January 2025, monthly data from the Western Cape Gambling and Racing Board and the Mpumalanga Economic Regulator revealed that Mpumalanga overtook Western Cape in annual betting revenue, including from online casino variants, for the first time last year.
Both markets cleared US$1bn in gross gaming revenue.
Although this includes some land-based betting, Vixio GamblingCompliance estimates that the South African online market comfortably cleared US$2bn in 2024.
Operators licensed in Mpumalanga include Hollywoodbets, Lottostar and SupaBets, while operators licensed in the Western Cape include Betway, Bet.co.za and Easybet.
Provinces Calling For Action
Western Cape is not the only province to call for online gambling regulation in recent months.
The province of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) recently warned it is not generating tax revenue from online gambling due to a lack of national legislation.
Francois Rodgers, KZN's Executive Council (MEC) member for finance and a member of the DA, warned that the KZN government risks overspending and could face a ZAR9bn (€467m) budget deficit, which revenue generated from online gambling could help address.
He told Vixio GamblingCompliance in October 2024: “Should the Remote Gambling Bill pass and be effected into operation, South Africa, and by extension KZN, may gain much-needed clarity and certainty on the country’s online gambling market.
“We may also see the growth of a well-regulated online gambling market with clear licensing, taxation, and consumer protection mechanisms.”
More recently, Gauteng's finance MEC, Lebogang Maile, said on March 18 during the province’s 2025/2026 budget presentation that he is preparing legislation to regulate online gambling.
“People are making a lot of money from online gambling. Unfortunately, most of those punters are from Gauteng and we are not getting the tax that is due to us. We are done with the draft amendment, it is there,” he said.
Gauteng is the largest contributor to the country’s GDP out of the provinces, at around 35 percent of the country’s total, according to the Gauteng provincial budget 2025/2026.
