The Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i has signed 14 deportation orders mainly for Eastern Europe citizens in Kenya illegally on gambling business.
He said that his firm instructions is that anyone who applied for a different permit and ended in gambling business, he is ready to sign their deportation papers today.
“We have to clean up the sector. We are not using the guise of revenue to allow a broken sector. Over 90 percent of players in gaming are foreigners, they repatriate a huge amount of money to their countries,” he said.
According to Matiang’i, the annual turnover in the gambling industry rose from Ksh.2 billion to over Ksh.200 billion in the last five years alone this is in spite of a Ksh.26 billion debt owed to the government through the KRA by the gaming and gambling sector.
He also said that the government supports investors doing business in the country as long as they are within the confines of the law.
“We are here to listen to each other but not to condemn each other, we respect your investment but understand that we have a country to protect and not when asked to pay taxes you rush to the court,” he said.
He instructed employers to advise their employees who are from outside and have permits to do serious businesses to let them respect our country.
He added that when proposals are brought to them in the right way they shall accommodate them.
Further, he appealed to gambling firms which have met the required regulations to cooperate with taxman without evasion.