Council makes it official on Entain 

More than four months after former Mohawk Council of Kahnawake (MCK) grand chief Kahsennenhawe Sky-Deer publicly acknowledged the “writing was on the wall” on Entain, an exclusive deal with the gaming company has been dissolved.

The response from Sky-Deer was uttered at the grand chiefs’ debate aired on K1037 Radio on June 24 in the run-up to the MCK elections.

The collapse of the profitability of Mohawk Online, the MCK’s online gaming entity, which paid $23 million in dividends to Kahnawake in less than a decade, was explored later the same week in an article in The Eastern Door. That article outlined the devastating extent of the breakdown, which followed Ontario’s decision to implement an iGaming regime. 

The news was never formally confirmed by Council, however.

“There were some legalities, obviously, over the last two years or so, the partnership going down this way. There were still things that needed to be worked out. We’re at a point now where we’re able to finally tell the community,” said Diabo. “I know there’s been, sort of, hints, I guess, coming along the way, but of course to make sure things are done properly, we just needed a little bit of time to finalize certain things.”

Council has been engaged in lawsuits with former Mohawk Online head Dean Montour, who claims he was wrongfully terminated and defamed.

The agreement between Mohawk Online and Entain, through its Avid International Ltd. subsidiary, was an exclusive partnership for the operation of Sports Interaction, a brand that was among the first licensees under the Kahnawake Gaming Commission in the 1990s.

The relationship with Entain began when it bought Avid International in 2022, but that same year Ontario established an iGaming regime that Kahnawake unsuccessfully challenged in court and which the MCK argued was an attack on the community’s jurisdiction over gaming.

Ontario’s iGaming program was made possible by the passage of Bill C-218, which legalized single-event sports betting under provincial regimes.

“Really it falls down to that 218 legislation that really kind of set the stage for a lot of different things,” said Diabo. “We tried at the time to get a carveout. Were there maybe other political actions we could have taken at the time? Who knows. I don’t know what could have been done at that point.”

In an interview with The Eastern Door, Montour accused Council of mismanaging the file, leading to the “catastrophic failure” of Mohawk Online.  

Diabo would not speak to the lawsuit directly, but he was steadfast in his position that it was external forces that caused the downfall of Mohawk Online.

“It’s hard to say what more could have been done. We did everything we could at the time,” said Diabo.

Diabo expressed hope that legislation currently in the works pertaining to First Nations dominion over gaming, Bill S-268, sponsored by senator Scott Tannas, could create opportunities for Kahnawake in the online gaming sphere without compromising its sovereignty.

However, while the communique from the MCK notes that the dissolution of the agreement with Entain releases Council from its obligations and clear it to explore new opportunities in online gaming, Diabo said there is no clear strategy in place to pursue online gaming revenues in the current legislative landscape.

“Essentially, right now, it’s just on hiatus,” he said of the Mohawk Online entity, which may or not be the vehicle for future online gaming endeavours. “Whether or not we plan to cancel the name or just keep it on the books for another opportunity, we’ve yet to have that conversation,” he said.

Diabo said the MCK is still in good financial health despite the loss of substantial revenues from Mohawk Online.

“For the community, this is the nature of doing business, so to speak. I just want to confer that we have been projecting not that much revenue coming in, however land-based had spiked up to fill in that gap a little bit, so there’s overall no loss,” he said. “There’s just no extra coming into the community, but we’ll just be looking on to more opportunities to ensure we can continue to provide different services to the community.”

Land-based gaming revenues have dramatically increased since the introduction of electronic gaming devices (EGDs), which were introduced by a pilot project in 2018 and have been made permanent.

Entain will continue to operate on the territory and hold onto its KGC licenses, according to an MCK press release.

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