Ethiopia Flags $169 Million in Betting Debts as It Prepares a Tighter Reopening

Ethiopia’s betting market is still shut, with no reopening date and no fresh licensing process on the table. The thing high-risk PSPs will care about: the regulator now says a draft audit found about $169 million in unpaid amounts to the state, and any relaunch is set to come with tighter supervision and a digital control layer.

1. According to a report by Fana Media Corporation, sports betting and lottery operators processed about $1.221 billion in transactions during the period under review. One operator accounted for around $53 million, while ten companies together handled about $117 million.
2. The draft audit says operators owed the state about $184 million in commissions, but only about $22 million was paid. The reported $169 million shortfall also includes fines, license renewal fees, and registration charges. The evaluation is provisional, and the full audit has not been published, so the figures across categories do not line up exactly.
3. Beza Girma, chief executive of the Ethiopian Lottery Service (ELS), said the regulator will use legal action to recover the identified amounts once the audit is completed. He also said a unified digital system is being developed to record and monitor operators’ financial and legal obligations.
4. The market closure happened in two steps. On 4 December 2025, the ELS suspended 22 operators while it investigated alleged regulatory and financial irregularities. On 15 December, it revoked all sports betting licenses and ordered operations to stop, both online and land-based.
5. The crackdown continued in 2026. In August, the Government Communication Service said action had been taken against 38 companies, accusing them of hiding customer data, evading taxes, concealing income, and carrying out illicit financial transactions. The statement said owners were detained and bank accounts frozen, but it did not name the companies or say how those cases ended.

For context, Ethiopia is not talking about a light-touch reset here. Mekiyu Mohammed, Minister of State for Culture and Sports, told Parliament in March that there was a high level of illegality in sports betting, and the regulator is now signaling that any reopening will be built around more oversight and “modern technology,” which in practice means more controls on operators, payments, and reporting.