KAHNAWAKE GAMING COMMISSION: an ineffectual and worthless online gambling regulatory body

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

KAHNAWAKE GAMING COMMISSION: an ineffectual and worthless online gambling regulatory body

The Kahnawake Gaming Commission is the online casino licensing body that supplies the license to Golden Palace Casino to run their operation from within Kahnawake territory.

In 2004, Golden Palace sabotaged the Athens Olympic Games with a streaker at one of the synchronised swimming finals.

There was substantial fallout as a result: Golden Palace gained "dishonourable mention" in the Casinomeister rogue section, with the following comments...

Well what's the big deal? The big deal is that this wasn't just some swim meet at the local college, this was the Olympics. These athletes train their entire lives for this moment. Win or lose, this was their moment and no one else's. For some self-serving "fool in the pool" stealing this moment away is not only disrespectful to the spirit of the games, but extremely insensitive to the players who were distracted by the interruption and confusion.

...and, in a precedent-setting move, the Kahnawake Commission publically sanctioned Golden Palace (this comment can be found by going to "News", then "News Archives" at the bottom, then scrolling to the bottom of that page):

In the past two weeks, the Kahnawake Gaming Commission (KGC) has received numerous complaints concerning an incident at the Olympic Games in Athens involving a person who ?streaked? an event displaying the name of one of the KGC?s permit holders: Golden Palace.

The KGC did not approve or condone the incident in question and does not approve or condone this type of 'marketing' by its permit holders.

After investigating the Athens incident and meeting with representatives of Golden Palace, the KGC has directed that:

1. Golden Palace will not use, promote, encourage or fund this type of 'marketing' ever again, and

2. Given the seriousness of the incident and the negative effect it has had on the community's reputation, Golden Palace will make a substantial donation to Kahnawake organizations to be identified by the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake.

The KGC is satisfied with Golden Palace?s cooperation throughout and considers the matter closed.

For further information, contact the Kahnawake Gaming Commission at 450-635-1076.

Mohawk Territory of Kahnawake
3 September, 2004

Note the part in bold:

Golden Palace will not use, promote, encourage or fund this type of 'marketing' ever again.

In February 2006, Golden Palace, in DIRECT contravention of the above Kahnawake ruling, did the exact same thing - they sabotaged the Winter Olympics with a streaker at one of the Curling events. The matter was reported at Casinomeister, and Kahnawake were contacted by Bailey. Since they had required that Golden Palace not repeat the stunt, surely sanctions would now swiftly follow?

Fully two weeks and four emails later, this was Bailey's report on their response:

Well, a little over two weeks and four emails later, Kahnawake finally acknowledged my existence.

They said they're handling this internally.

And that was it.

The Kahnawake Gaming Commission have no option on this one:

1) Their response after the first incident was that Golden Palace should not repeat this act of sabotage.

2) Golden Palace ignored them, and repeated it.

3) Kahnawake are going to do nothing.

A genuine regulatory body would have no option but to revoke the license on a licensee so flagrantly in contravention of their rulings.

Kahnawake have proved that, as a genuine "regulatory jurisdiction", they are ineffectual and worthless. How can you claim to "regulate" an entity when they completely ignore your directives and you do absolutely nothing about it?

eCOGRA recently got together with Kahnawake - see the Kahnawake recognizes eCOGRA principles of fair gaming press release of November 2005.

This is what eCOGRA say about the Kahnawake Gaming Commission:

The Commission's Regulations concerning Interactive Gaming were promulgated in July 1999, and are generally accepted as a model for regulating the global online gaming industry.

If this is true, then the online gambling industry is in a very, very sorry state of disrepair.

How can this ineffectual licensing jurisdiction be held up as a "model for regulating the global online gaming industry"?

UPDATE January 2008:

For Kahnawake's latest stab at regulation, see the Kahnawake Gaming Commission whitewash of Absolute Poker article.

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Bryan Bailey commented on the Kahnawake Gaming Commission in his latest webcast. The entry starts 9'45" from the beginning, and is worth a listen - it's really very good indeed.

By 100% Gambler, at 9:39 pm