The La Rapida lottery has even been described in books. She is mentioned in a publication on democratic changes in Andalusia (Crónica de un sueño: 1973-1983: Memoria de la transición democrática en Andalucía). As stated in this book, it gets its name from the speed with which prizes are awarded to winners. At the same time, the tariffs were not limited in any way, and the prizes were twice as high as those of legal lottery players (no one paid taxes).
The popularity of the lottery was such that in 1979 the deputy of Malaga, Carlos Sanjuan, asked the government to put an end to it. However, this attempt came to nothing. Three years later, sellers of legal lottery tickets went on strike because they couldn’t compete with La Rapida. Every day, underground traders sold tickets for 30 million pesetas (180,000 euros), while officials – only 2 million (12,000 euros).
Throughout the 20th century, the identity of the organizers of La Rapida remained secret. It wasn’t until 2014 that the police found out who is now running this underground lottery. It turned out to be a 64-year-old man who had several salespeople under him. Once again, he came to the attention of law enforcement in 2016, and then in 2023. The other day, they came to his house for a search and found various documents, according to which this elderly man received 250 at 500,000 euros per year.
Whether the current police operation will help shut down the oldest underground lottery, time will tell.
It should be noted that although La Rapida is the most popular in Andalusia, it is far from the only illegal lottery in the region. There are dozens of them here. It is this region of southern Spain which represents almost half of the sales of clandestine lotteries (5.6 million euros out of 12.5 million), notes El Mundo.
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