Many Thais have a penchant for gambling while having no real savings. Now the Pheu Thai party is offering them a new type of lottery which combines an enticement to save with the chance of winning prizes.
Pheu Thai party’s chief election strategist, Khunying Sudarat Keyuraphan, said they are proposing a “savings lottery”. Unlike ordinary lottery tickets, which are discarded without a winning number, she said that the price of the savings lottery tickets will not be lost, but will remain the account of the buyer with the chance of winning an amount equivalent to the two or three-digit prizes of the national lottery tickets.
A person who starts buying the savings lottery tickets at the age of 20, according to Sudarat, they will have a considerable nest-egg by the time they reach 60.
The party’s chief legal advisor, Chusak Sirinil, said that the party had thought through the “savings lottery” scheme carefully and believes that it could be done within current laws.
He said that the party’s savings scheme is different from the Government Savings Bank’s lottery because the party’s plan is to issue tickets every fortnight, like the national lottery tickets. Buyers will be able to purchase as many tickets as they want, but the money will remain in their “savings lottery” account and, if they are lucky, they will win small prizes, said Chusak.
