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Longest ever served President of the Ghana Football Association (GFA), Kwesi Nyantekyi, has revealed that SuperSport did not renew its sponsorship agreement with the association after expiry due to unprofitability.
According to him, the country in 2015 had a population of about 25 million, but subscription to the pay television to generate the revenue the sponsor hoped for, did not correspond.
SuperSport was the broadcaster of the Ghana Premier League and the MTN FA Cup for the season lasting from 2013 to 2016. When its contract with the GFA expired in September 2016, the company refused to enter into a new agreement with the football governing body.
This was after the pay television had gotten involved in some legal issues with the GFA over non-payment of arrears owed the former among other things.
However, from conversations held with the Managing Director of SuperSport in South Africa, Mr. Nyantekyi noted that the company’s refusal to renew the contract was influenced by Ghana’s inability to support in meeting the returns on the investment.
Out of Ghana’s total population, the number of subscribers to the pay television service was only 40,000, meanwhile the sponsor had invested US$700,000 into the Ghana Premier League, Mr. Nyantekyi noted.
“Botswana with a population of about 2 million people 200,000 people subscribed to the boxes. South Africa with a population of about 58 million people, over 2 million people have subscribed to the boxes.
“So it was convenient for SuperSport to put US$100 million in the South African League, 2 million in the Botswana League and $700,000 in the Ghana Premier League,” he told host of ‘Saving our passion’, Karl Tufour on GTV Sports+, which was monitored by Angelonline.com.gh on Thursday, February 10, 2022.
The former GFA boss added that when the company found the need to expand its business and have access to the world’s most patronised leagues, cutting expenditure in the African region became necessary, to be able to fund the games.
“Ghana was an easy target. They took Ghana and Botswana off and other countries as well and put the money into other leagues,” he disclosed.
