By Michael Ouma
Football associations in Africa have been urged to stand up and speak out about Confederation of African Football’s (CAF) exploitation of the continent’s football fans by exorbitantly charging broadcast stations for live airing of matches.
This is because exorbitant charges levied by CAF before broadcasters can carry live matches to their audiences during both regional and continental competitions has meant that not very many audiences who rely on free-to-air transmitted programmes can watch the matches after their respective broadcasting stations fail to pay the fees levied by CAF.
Speaking during the second day of the first African Broadcast, Film and Convergence Conference on how to buy and sell local and international programming, Mr Barry Lambert, Setanta Africa chief executive, said that African audiences and football fans have continuously been denied an opportunity to support their favourite teams during the CAF tournaments due to the high fees charged by the continent’s football association to air matches.
Mr Lambert gave the example of the 2006 Africa Cup of Nations hosted by Egypt when, despite being one of the qualifiers, Kenya was then asked by CAF to pay Euros 750,000 to enable local broadcasters to carry the matches live to their enthusiastic football audiences who were eager to watch the national team play.
“Even though the government through the support of the private sector was able to come up with the funds requested, it meant that the stations that had been able to screen the matches live were afterwards unable to support the production of local programmes as a significant amount of the funds had been spent to air the matches,” said Lambert.
He urged broadcast stations and productions to ensure that they make local content work for them by not just screening programmes but through promotion as well as creation of more audience interest.
“You must promote not surprise your viewers with new material,” Mr Lambert told broadcasters adding: “Take ownership of the programming and content but strive and ensure that you do not surprise your viewers and audiences with new material.”
