WITH 433 bettors emerging as jackpot winners in last Saturday’s 6/55 Grand Lotto draw, two lawmakers, one from the Senate and one from the House of Representatives, lost no time in seeking separate congressional probes for what some sectors have described as a highly improbable lotto draw result considering the large number of winning bettors successfully guessing the winning combination of 9-18-27-3645-54, all multiples of nine.

Last Saturday’s jackpot of P236,091,188 would be divided among the 433 winning tickets. One of the bettors was holding two winning tickets.

According to OCTA Research fellow and mathematician Guido David, the draw was highly unusual as the probability of having more than 400 winners in the 6/55 lottery is about one out of a number “followed by more than one thousand zeros.”

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel filed Senate Resolution 253 asking for an investigation “to determine and maintain the integrity and trustworthiness” of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO).

Over at the House of Representatives, House Minority Leader and 4Ps party-list Rep. Marcelino “Nonoy” Libanan filed House Resolution 463, asking for a separate inquiry into the October 1 6/55 draw saying “there is an urgent need for Congress to protect and ensure the integrity of the PCSO’s lotto operations considering their contributions to government coffers and to the economy.”

Wow! Almost the same wording and both resolutions ending in “3.” Maybe a congressional inquiry should also be conducted regarding this matter (LOL).

No isolated incident

Well, so much for their math and tamang hinala. This is not the first time this has happened. I mean multiple bettors picking the same combination and ending up winners in the process. And the Philippine draw last Saturday is not an isolated incident as it has also happened before in other countries. The only difference is those incidents did not merit any congressional or parliamentary investigation in those countries.

My kumpare, Ben Rosario called my attention early this week saying he recalls writing an article back in 2005 regarding a 6/45 draw wherein more than a thousand bettors divided the second prize among themselves after having successfully guessed five of the six numbers in the winning combination.

In his story back then (which I suppose he retrieved from his sent item in his email as he is not the type to keep hard copies for his file), Ben says that there were 1,326 bettors who bagged the second prize in the 6/45 lotto draw on Oct. 31, 2005.

The bettors picked 3-18-23-2837-42, a combination they simply lifted from the sample number pattern that was printed in the instructions on every lotto card.

And had they thought of changing the number 18 to 19, the Philippines could have recorded the biggest number of winners who would have divided the lotto jackpot. Only six bettors then went home P2,709,583.20 richer with the top prize.

The same also happened in Spain. Spain’s Sortero Extraordinario de Navidad, or the Spanish Christmas Lottery, generally considered to be the world’s largest lottery game, with the largest first prize/jackpot, produced 180 winners in the 2011 draw, dividing among themselves the €720 million jackpot, or €4 million each.

In the United Kingdom, the most winners for a single jackpot was 133 — they all picked the numbers 7, 17, 23, 32, 38 and 42 on Jan. 14, 1995.

Also in London, there were more than 4,000 bettors winning the second prize, having gotten five of the winning combinations — all multiples of seven (sounds familiar?). We are not alone.

All the abovementioned incidents, though happening either thousands of miles from each other or at different times, clearly indicate that no matter how the odds are almost hopelessly stacked against winning the lotto jackpot, there is always a one in a billion, nay trillion, chance that what took place in all those incidents in lotto history worldwide, is bound to happen again anytime, anywhere.

And that, out of the tens of millions of bettors, there will be like-minded persons who will experiment with number combinations and choose similar winning numbers that will come out in the lottery.

In fact, some years back, we employed a part-time carpenter to do repair work in my late parent’s house. Being new to the place, he asked me one time to accompany him to the nearest lotto outlet in our place. And guess what? He placed a bet on the combinations 1-2-3-4-5-6 and 8-16-24-32-40-48.

His reason? He believed he was the only one who came up with that idea so if ever that combination is drawn, he would emerge as the sole winner.

However, a study conducted by no less than the PCSO revealed that he is not alone when it comes to that idea.

Upon checking the system, PCSO officials said Filipino bettors tend to use common combinations, such as 1-2-34-5-6 and other combinations anchored on a single multiple.

So, what do the Senate and the HoR want to prove with their investigation? That there was some irregularity in the October 1 draw?

But in order to pull up a grand heist in that particular draw, it would have had to be a twotiered scheme. First, one has to leak the winning combination to those 433 bettors. But in order to leak the winning combination, you should first ensure that you could rig the draw which is conducted about an hour after the betting is closed.

Next to impossible

Unfortunately, rigging the lotto draw is next to impossible as there is no human intervention in choosing the winning numbers which are selected by the draw machines and the only act by a human is the pressing of the button to switch on the machine.

Apart from that, there are auditors from the Commission on Audit and private witnesses who are invited to watch the draw and ensure its integrity and prove that there are no irregularities.

And assuming for the sake of argument one was able to facilitate all those impossible things and was able to rig the draw, why would he or she want to disperse the jackpot to 433 individuals and complicate the collection or centralization of the jackpot prize to the mastermind? Why not simplify things and come up with a single winner?

I still can’t imagine why both houses of Congress would have to conduct these probes? Basically, congressional probes should be in aid of legislation. So, exactly what piece of legislation do Pimentel and Libanan expect to craft out of their probes? To ban multiple winners in a single lotto draw?

If nothing, then why not just leave the investigation, if there is suspicion of wrongdoing in the October 1 draw, to the National Bureau of Investigation and related agencies?

With no specific piece of legislation in mind, these probes would surely turn into a grandstanding show for these lawmakers. But we won’t be amused. Much better to send in the clowns. Or are they already in the house.