As the European football season begins this Sunday, with Chelsea battling Arsenal in the Community Shield at Wembley Stadium, front-line Nigerian sports betting company, Winners Golden Bet has promised football fans that they were guaranteed of their full winnings if they bet with the firm.

In this interview with Sports Vanguard, the Executive Director of Winners Golden Bet , Mr. Sulaiman Olabanji, says the strong financial base of the firm stands it out from other companies. Excerpts

What gives you the confidence that the delivery of your services is credible and reliable?
Let us start with my background in the business. I was introduced to the lottery industry by working in Winners Golden Chance which we started in 2004 of which I was a founding member.

I went through the fundamentals in both lottery and gaming and laid the foundation on which Winners Golden Bet was built on. For effective management of this business we have made it a priority to view it as one set up with public funds promoting management discipline because of huge funds involved.

What would you say makes Winners Golden Bet stand out among other Sport Betting Companies?

Our financial base is a strong point. There was a particular time in the past when licenses were not given to us by the government and most of us were operating illegally because a monopoly form of license was given to the then Orion Technologies but after keenly contesting this move, a lot of us were granted licenses.

Being the unique sports betting company we are and supported by our maiden company Winners Golden Chance, we were able to muster up to 200 million naira as foundation funds renewable every 5 years with 100 million naira.

This happened in an industry where a sports betting company’s start-up fund is roughly 20 million naira. So I can categorically say our financial base is one that makes us stand out amongst others.

Aside having such huge financial muscle, what other feature would you say makes Winners Golden Bet stand out?

Experience is another strong feature. Experience in dealing with stakers, agents, internal and optimum financial management. You see the issue of effectively redistributing finances in this industry is really important and if not professionally done it might cause the downfall of the Sports Betting company and in Winners Golden Bet this is handled very professionally with our 10 years of experience inherited from the our maiden company from a sister industry.

In which areas are you touching lives of Nigerians?

Many agents don’t have the needed capital to start up this business, so we try to help out, with at least 500,000 naira.. We have made this our corporate social responsibility and over time taken it seriously.