Azam Media and t have officially sealed a three-year 5.5bn/- deal, to provide Azam TV rights to broadcast live and recorded Mainland’s Vodacom Premier League matches.
Tanzania Football Federation (TFF)
The contract was signed in Dar es Salaam by Azam Media’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Rhys Torrington and the TFF Vice-President Athmani Nyamlani.
Under the three-year contract, all 14 top flight clubs will receive 100m/- annually, while the TFF will be entitled to 10 per cent of the total amount for the administration’s running costs.
The amount will be paid in lump sum and sponsors have vowed to continue treating all teams equally. Earlier, the two parties had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the same.
The MoU had a grace period of 30 days for the contracting parties to confirm what was signed. Already, Azam Media has delivered a total of 325m/- to 13 premier league clubs for preparations.
Each team got 25m/-, but giants and league’s defending champions Young Africans vehemently opposed the deal, suggesting that it was ‘shoddy’ and would not benefit the club.
Yanga refused to take the money, showing their disagreement on the Azam TV deal. However, the matter has been resolved amicably following intervention from the Ministry of Information, Youth, Culture and Sports and Yanga were still on the negotiation table with Azam management to see how best their benefits will be addressed.
Signing the deal, Torrington expressed Azam’s commitment to invest further in Tanzania football.
“We are delighted to have forged this partnership with TFF, our commitment is to invest in Tanzanian football and we’ll ensure it becomes one of the most attractive and profitable within Africa and beyond,” said Torrington.
Nyamlani thanked Azam’s management for coming forward to support the league, saying the milestone signing would add value to the league.
“We are honoured to partner with Azam Media and we feel this is an opportunity for our clubs to display their talents on the big stage and it will give them opportunity to acquire more sponsors within and outside the country as Azam TV aim to cross borders,” he said.
However, fans will still have to wait for the live and recorded footages to come on their television sets as Torrington promised that the pay television DHT platform ‘Azam TV’ will soon be launched.
The new Azam TV services will be offering 50+ channels. The top flight league kicked off last weekend and already two rounds have been played with JKT Ruvu standing top of the table with maximum six points as defending champions Young Africans, Simba SC and Azam FC are glued on four points each.
Azam Media has also recently concluded discussions with the relevant rights holders to acquire other local and international popular programmes to be broadcast on Azam TV. These will include other sports such as tennis, boxing, children programmes, and talk shows.
By GLADNESS GEOFREY, Tanzania Daily News
