South Africa - SOMUCHPOKER

Before we get to gambling and poker, we need to address something in our basic information table about South Africa: yes, the country has three legal capital cities. Each branch of government has its base in a different city: the executive in Pretoria, the judicial in Bloemfontein and the legislative in Cape Town. 

As for gambling, legislation was passed by Dutch settlers as early as 1673. Unfortunately, that law banned all games of chance. In 1965, another piece of legislation restricted gambling again – this time, however, giving an exemption to horse race betting. Gambling finally became legal and regulated in South Africa in 1996.

According to a 2006 survey, the most popular game of chance in the country is by far the national lottery, with 96% (!) of the population admitting to having participated in it. Scratch-off tickets, slot machines, and horse race betting are next on the list – unfortunately, poker was nowhere near the top spots on this “popularity contest”.

This is reflected in the number of venues as well. Worldcasinoriectory.com lists 59 casinos currently running in South Africa. However, pokerdiscover.com only lists 12 poker rooms in the country. As for horse race tracks, they have 10. 

Despite that, South Africa has been home to many major poker events. They’ve hosted Poker News Cup, World Poker Tour, and even World Series of Poker Africa events in the past few years. All 3 African legs of the WSOP (in 2010, 2012, and 2013) were held in Vanderbijlpark.

Famous Poker Players from South Africa

Raymond Rahme currently tops South Africa’s all time money list on Hendon with $3.546 million in career earnings. He’s best known for taking 3rd place in the 2007 WSOP Main Event, right behind Tuam Lam and the eventual winner Jerry Yang. He won $3.048 million, which is by far the biggest single live tournament cash of his career. Before the 2007 World Series of Poker, he only had a single tournament cash on his “resume”. 

Second behind Rahme on the Hendon list is Jarred Solomon with $1.611 million in winnings. He too has a deep run in the Main, although not nearly as “deep” as Rahme’s – in 2019, he came in 79th place for $98,120. He also has two titles from WPT South Africa, a WSOP Africa title, and a runner-up finish in the $10,000 Pot Limit Hold’em event at the 2011 WSOP for $354,460.

As for online poker, Ashlee de Lange has been very successful playing under the screen name “elemeNt_za” on PokerStars and the now defunct poker room Full Tilt. He has $476,000 in online MTT cashes.