Dominican Republic representatives, who also own lottery shops, are now asking for new regulations in the lottery industry.
After several people complained that it’s not an ideal situation for them to be state employees and lottery shop owners, local outlet Diario Libre interviewed some representatives and they explained that they’re in favour of regulatory amendments.
Last month, the Federación Nacional de Bancas de Loterías (Fenabanca), the national federation of lottery shops, asked President Luis Abinader to comply with the measures that he pledged to follow to improve lotteries when he was sworn in last year.
According to the authority, the biggest problem that it’s currently facing is the illegal installation of hundreds of shops that violate the minimum distance of 200 meters between each other established by Decree 730-02.
They also highlighted other issues such as tax evasion, low sales because of the pandemic, operating restrictions due to the lockdown and the implementation of other verticals to sell lottery tickets.
Both Fenabanca and the representatives are working on initiatives to regulate the sector, as Representative Florián Terrero said: “We wanted to reach the Congress to come up with laws that would allow us to regulate this sector.”
The representatives are ‘interested in regulating the sector to stop the installation of new shops that have expanded during the pandemic.’
They also recalled that many of these shops subsequently obtained licenses to operate legally and many others are in the process to get a license.
Current lottery operators explained that since the approval of Law 61-18, where the prohibition against new lottery shops was lifted, competition has increased.
Although the measure was supposed to be applied for just that year, shops have increasingly expanded in the Dominican Republic.
Representative Carlos José Gil Rodríguez, who operates La Dinámica shops, said that the business is now ‘less profitable,’ and explained that the problem was also aggravated by online sales.