In the wide markets of Enugu, between the bustle of traders and the heat of the Nigerian sun, something unusual appeared last November: sleek medical tents branded with the logo of an international betting company. Here, amid the everyday commerce of survival, nurses checked blood pressure and tested glucose levels, while residents queued with a mixture of curiosity and skepticism. This was 1win Charity at work, the philanthropic arm of a betting platform, now dispensing healthcare where government clinics struggle to reach.
The scene underscores a peculiar moment in African development: when corporations from unexpected sectors position themselves as social benefactors, filling gaps left by overwhelmed public systems. 1win, an international holding company better known for online gaming than humanitarian work, launched its charity division in early 2024 with the motto “We Care. We Share.” Within months, the company had planted its flag across Africa, from Nigerian health camps to Ghanaian cancer wards, claiming to have helped 30,000 people globally with over $300,000 in donations.
Yet this narrative demands interrogation. In an era when corporate philanthropy often serves as both genuine assistance and calculated brand-building, what does it mean when a gaming company becomes a healthcare provider? And in African communities where needs are vast and resources scarce, how do we parse the ethics of help that comes wrapped in corporate logos?
The Prescription and the Brand
The numbers tell one story. In Nigeria’s Enugu and Anambra states, 1win’s partnership with the Helpers Social Development Foundation aimed to screen 10,000 people for diabetes and hypertension, which are conditions that kill silently in communities where routine check-ups remain a luxury. The timing was strategic, aligning with Nigeria’s national “Project 10 Million” campaign to combat non-communicable diseases that affect one in every 27 Nigerians.
But numbers rarely capture the full picture. In villages like Umunebo and Akwuoba, the arrival of free health screenings represented something more complex than simple charity. For residents accustomed to traveling hours for basic medical care, these branded tents offered immediate access to potentially life-saving diagnostics. Yet they also introduced a new dynamic: healthcare as corporate gift, medical intervention as marketing opportunity.
The screenings operated from morning to afternoon, staffed by local healthcare workers who provided not just tests but tailored advice on managing chronic conditions. A grassroots approach, meeting people “at their doorsteps,” as local officials noted, addressed a fundamental challenge in African healthcare delivery. When formal systems fail to reach rural populations, who fills the void? Increasingly, it seems, the answer includes unlikely actors from the private sector.
Plastic Bottles and Numbers
January 2025 brought another dimension to 1win’s African engagement. In partnership with Recycledge, the company launched a Plastic Waste Exchange campaign in Nigeria, where citizens could trade plastic bottles for vouchers, food items, or cash. The goal was modest — to collect 5,000 kilograms of plastic waste. But the implications were larger.
Nigeria generates over 2.5 million tons of plastic waste annually, with more than 70% mismanaged, choking waterways and degrading landscapes. Against this environmental crisis, 1win’s initiative appears almost quaint in scale. Yet it revealed something about how corporate charity operates in spaces of systemic failure. By incentivizing individual recycling behaviors, the campaign created immediate, tangible benefits for participants while barely scratching the surface of the pollution problem.
The presence of a Nollywood actor at the campaign launch added celebrity gloss to environmental activism, transforming waste collection into media event. This is the contemporary grammar of corporate philanthropy: real problems addressed through symbolic gestures, amplified by strategic communications. The plastic collected was genuinely recycled, the participants genuinely compensated. But whether such initiatives challenge or merely accommodate the structures that create environmental degradation remains an open question.
The Christmas Factor
Perhaps nowhere was the emotional calculus of corporate charity more visible than at Korle Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra, Ghana, last December. Here, 1win Charity and AdjahCancer Support Ghana distributed food hampers, clothing, and Christmas gifts to over 200 cancer patients and their families. The timing was deliberate — the holiday season when financial strains intensify and emotional vulnerabilities peak.
Cancer treatment in Ghana, as across much of Africa, often means catastrophic out-of-pocket expenses in a system where insurance coverage remains limited. Families mortgage futures for chemotherapy, sell assets for radiation. Into this landscape of medical precarity, 1win’s donations arrived as both relief and reminder: relief from immediate material needs, reminder of the arbitrary nature of such assistance.
The involvement of local celebrity Joselyn Dumas, who helped distribute gifts while speaking of “global brands stepping up,” highlighted how corporate charity creates its own ecosystem of validation. Yet for the families receiving food staples and clothing, such critiques likely seemed academic. When you’re struggling to afford both medicine and meals, the source of help matters less than its arrival.
The Architecture of Assistance
What emerges from 1win’s African initiatives is a portrait of modern corporate philanthropy as a complex transaction between need and strategy, genuine assistance and calculated positioning. The company’s approach, such as partnering with local NGOs, aligning with government health campaigns, leveraging celebrity endorsements — follows a playbook increasingly common among corporations seeking social legitimacy.
This isn’t inherently cynical. The blood pressure readings were real, the plastic was recycled, the cancer patients received actual support. In communities where government services falter, such interventions provide concrete benefits. The question isn’t whether corporate charity helps (clearly, it does), but rather what kind of social contract it implies.
When healthcare comes courtesy of a gaming company, when environmental protection depends on corporate incentives, when holiday relief arrives branded and packaged, we’re witnessing a particular vision of development. It’s one where market actors fill public gaps, where brand-building and social good intertwine, where help comes with logos attached.
The Bigger Picture
1win’s charity work must be understood within the broader context of rising corporate social responsibility across Africa. From Safaricom’s community programs in Kenya to Standard Bank’s development initiatives in South Africa, private sector engagement in social issues has become standard practice. This trend reflects both opportunity and necessity — opportunity for companies to build goodwill and market presence, necessity because public resources often fall short of public needs.
The effectiveness of such initiatives often depends on their integration with existing systems. When 1win’s health screenings complement national campaigns, when recycling drives support environmental policies, the impact multiplies. But when corporate charity operates in isolation, creating parallel systems rather than strengthening public ones, questions of sustainability arise.
There’s also the matter of scale. While 1win claims to have helped 30,000 people globally, Africa’s healthcare and environmental challenges operate at a different magnitude entirely. Nigeria alone needs millions of health screenings, not thousands. The plastic waste crisis requires systemic solutions, not just community collection drives. Corporate charity, however well-intentioned, can sometimes obscure the scale of public investment needed.
What’s Next?
As 1win Charity marks its first year, its African experiments offer lessons about the evolving nature of corporate philanthropy on the continent.
Will these initiatives evolve from pilot projects to sustained programs? Will health screenings lead to follow-up care systems? Will recycling campaigns catalyze broader environmental movements? Or will they remain what critics might call “philanthropic tourism” — brief corporate visits to communities in need, generating photos and statistics before moving on?
The answer likely depends on whether 1win and similar corporations view African charity as investment or expense, partnership or publicity. The communities that queued for blood pressure checks in Enugu, that traded plastic bottles for food vouchers, that received Christmas hampers in Accra — they represent not just beneficiaries,but stakeholders in an ongoing experiment about who provides social goods and on what terms.
