The legitimacy of the Philippines' biggest lottery has been called into question after 433 players matched the winning number combination last weekend to share a total prize pool of $4 million.
The draw in question, the
Grand Lotto, is operated by a state-owned company
and Philippine authorities have denied allegations of fraud, but some lawmakers are investigating the incident to ensure the lottery's reputation.
The prize in question was distributed on October 1 and the 433 winners agreed on the combination of six numbers (09-45-36-27-18-54).
To win you didn't have to have the combination in that order.
The winners
will receive 545,000 Philippine pesos (about $9,300, before taxes)
, which is more than double the average annual salary in the Philippines, according to
The New York Times.
The Philippine lottery draw is daily and is broadcast on the Internet, radio and television. Karl Tapales / Getty Images
The unusual number of winners in the same draw uncovered signs of fraud by some players who did not win the prize.
Meanwhile, mathematicians and statisticians say that, although it is rare for something like this to happen, it is not impossible.
Some Filipinos are convinced that the Philippine Charitable Sweepstakes Bureau, which organizes the lottery, scammed them.
The state organization, however, denied the accusation.
Melquiades Robles, general director of the Office of Charitable Raffles of the Philippines, assured that they do not see "nothing wrong" in what happened.
And he added that the draw was "as ordinary" as any other, "except we have a lot of winners."
This daily draw is broadcast on the Internet and through all radio and television stations in the Philippines.
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The six number winning combination contains only multiples of nine.
How is it possible that this has happened 433 times?
Chua Tin Chiu, a statistician at the National University of Singapore, said that
humans are good at distinguishing patterns.
"But at the same time we have to analyze whether this particular phenomenon is based on chance or not," he added.
"If it is, there's nothing unusual about it."
The nature of chance
Guido David, a professor of mathematics at the University of the Philippines, Diliman, also asserted, regarding the coincidence of multiples of nine, that this result is "as concrete as any other."
David even uploaded a video to the social network Twitter explaining his reasoning, but many of us are still convinced by that theory, especially since some members of the organization, as users on social networks pointed out,
have been convicted of bribery
and even one of them won once and collected the prize.
The winner of the 1,340 million dollars of the Mega Millions has not claimed his prize
Aug. 26, 202201:28
Elizalde Dumile, a 49-year-old man who has bet on the same number combination this time, finds it suspicious that the prize, now, is this big.
He has won a maximum of 500 Philippine pesos ($8.50) in past draws
.
"Did 433 people match all six numbers at the same time?" asked Dumile, a domestic worker from Cotabato City, in the southern Philippines.
"There's something suspicious there."
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The minority leader of the House of Representatives of that country, Marcelino Libanan, said that they will investigate the case "to safeguard the dreams and hopes of millions of Filipinos."
But for Professor Chua, the answer to this whole problem is simpler: human beings do not understand, or misunderstand, the nature of randomness.
