Hulu Sport Wins in Court, But Stays Closed

Jul 25 , 2026. By NAHOM AYELE ( FORTUNE STAFF WRITER )

For Hulu Sport, the judgment is a reversal of a revocation it calls unlawful and damaging, imposed on suspicion rather than established findings and without a chance to defend itself. For the National Lottery Administration and the Ministry of Revenues, it raises pointed questions about the limits of delegated regulatory authority and the procedures that public bodies should follow when their actions affect private businesses.

Judges at the Federal High Court have overturned the National Lottery Administration's decision to suspend Hulu Sport, one of the country's leading sports betting operators, finding the regulator's action legally flawed.

Yet the company's return to business remains on hold, after the Administration has appealed and secured a temporary stay of execution. A firm that won its case in Court still cannot reopen its doors, and the gap between the two outcomes is where the dispute now sits.

Hulu Sport was among the operators whose licences were suspended last December. It took its fight to the Administrative Bench of the Federal High Court, on Chad St., accusing the National Lottery Administration and the Ministry of Revenues of administrative injustice, imposed without due process.

Owned by a technology firm, Hulegeb Online Solution Plc, the company entered the market in 2017.

A three-judge panel of Yesuf Mohammed, Kedir Endris and Zenebe Gebrehiwot unanimously ruled in its favour. The company’s executives promptly told their customers of their preparation to resume business.

Last December, the Lottery Administration revoked the licences of 22 sports betting companies, alleging the operators had deprived the government of more than 100 billion Br in public revenue. Hulu was one of them.

Aggrieved, its managers petitioned the Administrative Bench, arguing through their attorney, Thomas Hailemichael, that the decision lacked legal grounds and unlawfully infringed the rights of thousands of employees and shareholders. They contested that the regulator had failed to follow the legal procedures required before a revocation.

The grievance widened to draw in the Ministry of Revenues. Although oversight of betting licences ultimately rests with the Ministry, Hulu Sport said that when it asked the Ministry to review what it called “an unlawful decision,” the Ministry declined, stating that it had delegated its authority to the National Lottery.

The Ministry was consequently joined as a co-defendant. By failing to discharge their statutory duties and acting beyond their powers, the company argued, both agencies had caused it substantial harm, leaving them jointly and severally liable.

Hulu Sport’s lawyer argued that the authorities had imposed punitive administrative measures without any judicial finding of criminal liability, in effect treating suspicion as proof of guilt.

The company argued that its “rights against punishment without a judicial determination have been denied.”

“Being merely a suspect under criminal investigation does not constitute guilt,” said the petition, “revocation does not constitute guilt."

The defendants maintained that several operators, Hulu among them, were under investigation for alleged money laundering, but the company countered that criminal liability can be established only by a court, not presumed through an administrative order.

The procedural complaints ran deeper still. The Plaintiff’s lawyer claimed that the regulator had denied his client due process by revoking its licence without first giving it the right to be heard, when it should have been formally notified of the allegations and allowed to present a defence before any sanction. He also questioned the legal basis of the regulator's move, arguing that investigating alleged tax evasion falls to law-enforcement agencies, prosecutors and the courts rather than the National Lottery Administration.

The lawyer alleged that the Administration had never specified the factual and legal grounds for the revocation, ordering the closure of betting operations without naming the violations attributed to the company or explaining the legal basis for the decision.

The company also framed the shutdown as self-defeating for the state, arguing that closing its operations not only caused heavy losses but cut off a source of tax revenue, harming the government's own fiscal interests.

"Before revoking our licence, they should have monitored our bank accounts and assigned auditors to strictly supervise us while allowing us to continue working," the Plaintiff argued.

The company’s lawyer challenged the Ministry's claim that delegating power does not relinquish a public agency’s duty to supervise the authority exercising it, claiming it is liable for its alleged failure to review or intervene after the suspension.

Hulu Sport appealed to judges to declare the revocation unlawful and set it aside, restore its operating licence, and direct all institutions to recognise the invalidation of the directive and facilitate an immediate resumption of business.

The state institutions held their ground. The National Lottery Administration defended the revocation as a measure taken in the public interest to safeguard government revenue and protect the national economy. Its lawyers insisted that the Administration had acted within the powers delegated to it by the Ministry of Revenues and that the law expressly authorised it to regulate operators, including suspending or revoking licences where warranted.

The Ministry of Revenues backed this position, arguing that no legal error had been committed, that the National Lottery Administration had acted within its delegated authority. Its lawyers alleged that Hulu Sport was among the companies suspected of concealing “billions of Birr in public revenue,” conduct they claimed had harmed both public finances and the wider economy.

The panel of judges was unpersuaded. It found that the defendants had failed to address Hulu Sport's grievance through the procedures prescribed under administrative law and had denied the company its right to be heard before imposing the revocation. Judges set the decision aside, removing the legal basis on which the regulator had suspended the company's operations.

After a nearly seven-month battle, the company appeared to clear the way for a reopening. Buoyed, Hulu Sport told its customers it was preparing to restart.

The relief proved brief. On Tuesday last week, the company disclosed that its reopening had been put on hold after the National Lottery Administration lodged a fresh appeal and secured a 15-day stay of execution, freezing enforcement of the judgment pending further review.

The dispute now moves up to the Court of Cassation, which will decide whether the Administrative Bench's ruling should stand, leaving the planned reopening in limbo.

PUBLISHED ON Jul 25,2026 [ VOL 27 , NO 1369]