‘No way’ Powerball sequence was rigged, says Ithuba
Lottery operator Ithuba has denied accusations that Tuesday evening’s winning Powerball numbers were rigged.
The winning numbers, which
were the unlikely combination of 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and Powerball number 10, have
been described as a scam by some on social media.
Ithuba, which operates the
lottery, says the sequence is unusual but not uncommon.
"There is no way the results could have been rigged because there is no human intervention at all when comes to the draw procedure. We use a system called, random number generator, where the numbers are generated randomly. The system is used worldwide, it is audited and verified," says spokesperson Busisiwe Msizi.
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Msizi says people tend to play similar sequences all the time.
"It just happened that this time around 20 different people across the country manually selected these numbers via different play channels. Some at retail outlets and we have two who selected via their banking apps.”
She says the odds of winning are 1 in 42 million, whether it's a simple and basic sequence or a complex one.
