LILONGWE-(MaraviPost)-The country’s Super League exclusive television rights holders Beta Television on Wednesday officially announced that will no longer beam the top flight league due to financial challenges.
The development is contrary to last week’s assurance from the company that it had secured sponsorship and promised that would unveil before last weekend’s kick-off of the league.
The announcement means that the television station has failed to fulfil the contractual obligation it undertook last season after a successful bid but now putting Super League of Malawi (Sulom) in fixed position.
Beta Television station manager Theunis Bester disclosed that the company has no money to continue with the obligation of giving Malawians live match coverage.
Bester disclosed that a single match was costing about MK500, 0000 whose returns could not surpass the expenditure hence the decision to suspend the live coverage.
The Beta TV manager was however quick to say that the situation is not permanent and that the station remains the exclusive Super League matches holders and see to the end.
“After failing to secure sponsorship, we have decided to stop production of Super League games until we get the sponsorship. It’s not that we are pulling out of it forever but we are just temporarily halting production because it seems it’s expensive to do it at the moment. There is no money to pay salaries and other expenses
“To beam live a single match cost us about MK500, 000. So, with the closure of Kamuzu Stadium most of the games will be played Mulanje. The partnership with MBC means that we were supposed to cover four games per week and for us to produce those games requires MK2 million, and that is why we need significant sponsorship,” explained Bester.
But Sulom Treasurer, Tiya Somba discosed that they will consult their legal advisors on how best to handle Beta TV decision saying the latter has breached the contract agreement.
Beta signed a three-year contract with Sulom in 2016 but the station failed to pay the league governing body MK40 million of which MK32 million was meant for to be shared by clubs.
Sulom opted to award Beta TV the rights at the expense of Times and Matindi Televisions which emerged on the second and third places respectively in the bidding process.
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