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Brazil – Moves afoot to pass gambling bill before end of the year

By - 21 November 2022

Brazilian newspaper Folha do São Paulo has published an analysis on the chances of the gambling bill getting passed in the senate.  According to the newspaper, senators want to vote this year on the bill to legalise gambling in Brazil, (PL 442/1991) in order to remove the responsibility of President-elect Lula da Silva so that he doesn’t have to publically decide on the controversial issue.

The project was approved in the Chamber of Deputies in February and since then has been languishing in the senate.

According to Folha do São Paulo the expectation is that, in the Senate, the text will be put forward by the former president of the Chamber, Davi Alcolumbre, who currently heads the Constitution and Justice Commission. Several groups of senators speculate that the vote, this year, would damage the administration of Bolsonaro.  As President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva would not have to deal with the controversy of voting for a text that is unpopular amongst a large section of the population, especially evangelicals, his administration would gain the additional tax revenue to spend while not paying the political cost.

Despite the intention to schedule the project for this year, a number of senators want the sports betting bill to be given final approval first which would be seen as a step before the legalization of a wider gambling bill. The government of President Jair Bolsonaro has until December 12 of this year to finalize the process of regulating sports betting in Brazil, according to the law enacted by then President Michel Temer on December 12, 2018. Law number 13,756 requires the Ministry of Finance (currently the Ministry of Economy) to promote the regulation of sports betting within a time limit of four years. The bill seeks to raise additional income for the government by green lighting sports betting and gave the Ministry of Finance initially just two years to get sports betting up and running (although this could be extended for a further two).

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