Eswatini gambling probe expands as police investigate organised crime
Eswatini’s Royal Eswatini Police Service (REPS) has told the High Court that the country’s illegal online gambling investigation has expanded into an international fraud and organised crime probe.
Detective Constable Ntokozo Dlamini of the Organised Crime Unit filed the affidavit. According to the document, Telegram and WhatsApp material recovered from seized devices pointed to alleged links between the criminal enterprise and senior politicians, police officials and immigration officials.
The court papers say more than 400 electronic devices are under forensic examination, with assistance from INTERPOL.
INTERPOL’s own public account of the case, released under Operation First Light 2026, cites 240 devices seized and 82 people arrested in the specific highlighted Eswatini action.
Police seized the devices during coordinated raids on premises in Mbabane and Ezulwini earlier in 2026, including at Castle Hotel in Mbabane. Officers say the hotel served as one of the syndicate’s principal command centres.
A gambling raid to an international probe
The investigation began as a domestic illegal gambling and immigration case. The Royal Eswatini Police Service raided several sites in and around Mbabane in March 2026, arresting 146 foreign nationals, many of them Chinese, Taiwanese, Indonesian, Cambodian and Brazilian.
Police seized 313 electronic devices during that first phase. The suspects face charges under the Gaming Control Act, the Money Laundering and Financing of Terrorism (Prevention) Act and the Immigration Act.
The subsequent forensic examination broadened the investigation. According to Detective Constable Dlamini, extracted material shows an organised operation targeting victims in Brazil and India while running unlicensed online gambling platforms from Eswatini.
Investigators say the syndicate pooled proceeds and converted them into cryptocurrency, chiefly USDT, before routing them through financial institutions in Abu Dhabi and the United States and back into Eswatini.
Fake Brazilian police and confidentiality contracts
The wider investigation also uncovered an elaborate impersonation scam linked to the criminal network. Investigators found what appeared to be a fake Brazilian police holding facility at Castle Hotel, complete with Brazilian police uniforms, a bulletproof vest, five communication radios and a Brazilian Federal Police badge.
Members of the network posed as Brazilian Federal Police officers during video calls. They told targets they were under criminal investigation. Victims were pressured to sign fraudulent “confidentiality agreements” and to transfer money to accounts supposedly held by the Brazilian Central Bank for “safekeeping”.
INTERPOL identified approximately 40 Brazilian citizens defrauded by the operation. It deployed its Operational Support Team to Eswatini as part of Operation First Light 2026, which intercepted illicit assets worth US$293 million across 97 countries.
Police push for a licence freeze
The political pressure on Eswatini’s licensing regime has grown in parallel. National Commissioner of Police Vusi Manoma Masango wrote to the principal secretary at the Ministry of Tourism and Environmental Affairs on 2 June 2026, recommending temporary suspension of gambling licence issuance pending the outcome of the investigation.
The memorandum, copied to home affairs, the attorney general and the Eswatini Financial Intelligence Unit, warned that continued licence issuance during an active probe could invite further infiltration.
“The continued issuance of licences during the pendency of investigations may inadvertently create opportunities for further infiltration by criminal elements whose intentions may undermine the country’s internal security, economic integrity and investor confidence,” the memorandum reads.
Masango has also publicly ruled out political immunity for anyone implicated.
“No individual is above the law, regardless of rank or political influence and we do not fear them,” he told the Times of Eswatini on 3 August.
Senators ask prime minister to investigate
The investigation has now reached parliament. Senate Deputy President Ndumiso Mdluli asked Prime Minister Russell Mmiso Dlamini in mid-August to investigate whether politicians were unwittingly renting out accommodation to foreign nationals involved in illegal online gambling.
“I also want to request the PM as well, he must investigate for us and ascertain if these criminals who have been involved in online gambling are not in the homes of some of us,” Mdluli said in the Senate.
Mdluli also flagged that penalties remain low enough for offenders to pay a fine and move on.
In June, 84 of the arrested foreign nationals were convicted of immigration offences, not gambling offences. Principal Magistrate Fikile Nhlabatsi handed down six-month sentences with the option of paying a fine of E500 ($30).
Investigation puts regulatory framework under scrutiny
Eswatini’s Gaming Control Act of 2022 is in force, but its implementing regulations are still being developed. MPs called for new gambling licences to be halted until the regulations are finalised and tabled before parliament, first during a House of Assembly sitting on 18 December 2025.
The Ministry of Tourism and Environmental Affairs has since paused new applications and renewed only four existing licences under strict oversight. The Ministry of Finance has told the High Court that the unregulated environment risks landing Eswatini on international financial-crime grey lists.
The forensic examination of the seized devices continues. The police say they will produce a comprehensive report at a later stage.
The findings could add further pressure on Eswatini to strengthen its gambling regulatory and enforcement framework. Either way, what began in March 2026 as a raid on unlicensed operators in Mbabane and Ezulwini has become a much larger case involving multiple victims in a wide-ranging and sophisticated scam. In all likelihood, it will have a significant impact on how gambling is regulated going forwards.