Piggs Peak appeals ruling

By Leon Engelbrecht, ITWeb senior writer

Johannesburg, 22 Jan 2007

Casino Enterprises, the company that runs Piggs Peak online casino, among other gambling sites, has appealed an adverse ruling by Pretoria High Court judge Willie Hartzenberg.

"We have put in papers to appeal," says the company's operations director Lew Saul Koor.

"Piggs Peak served application for leave to appeal on 7 December 2006, in the High Court, against the judgement and order handed down by Justice Hartzenberg on 28 November 2006," says Lucky Lukhwareni, of the Gauteng Gambling Board.

Hartzenberg gave Casino Enterprises until 15 December to redraft an application for a court order that could declare its Internet gambling operations in SA legal. In his 27 November judgment, Hartzenberg said that, in his view, Casino Enterprises did not disclose a reason for approaching him for the order.

"In the result, I shall set aside the declaration and allow the plaintiff time to file an amended declaration," Hartzenberg said in the judgment, of which ITWeb has a copy.

Lukhwareni says the effect of what he and Casino Enterprises termed an "appeal" is "that the judgement and order handed down by Justice Hartzenberg on 28 November 2006 is suspended until such time the appeal is heard.

"This means the legal ambiguity about online gambling continues and that online gamblers and online gambling advertisers have a further reprieve from prosecution."

The Gauteng Gambling Board cautions it has instructed its attorney to oppose Piggs Peak's "application for leave to appeal and to lodge an application to order Piggs Peak to comply with the judgement handed down by Justice Hartzenberg, while waiting for the appeal be heard".

However, Piggs Peak says it is "business as usual".

Despite Hartzenberg effectively having set the case aside, the parties involved have drawn diametrically opposite conclusions from the case. The National and Gauteng Gambling Boards view Hartzenberg's judgment as a victory and have threatened to prosecute online casinos, gamblers and advertisers alike, while Casino Enterprises believes its activities remain perfectly legal.

Meanwhile, Cabinet in December approved a Draft Gambling Amendment Bill to regulate online and cellphone gambling. National Gambling Board CEO Thibedi Majake last month said his board would license online casinos once the Bill becomes law.