AFCON 2021 Qualifiers: Ghana-South Africa broadcast in limbo

Published on: 09 November 2019

Ghana's game against South Africa in the AFCON 2021 qualifiers on Thursday might not be shown on TV after SuperSports stated they will not be showing any CAF content. 

SuperSports announced on Friday, the game might not be shown because of the termination of the contract between CAF and right holders Lagardere.

“Due to the termination by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) of its agency agreement with Lagardere, SuperSport will not be broadcasting CAF content, commencing with the Afcon under-23 championship, starting in Egypt this weekend, until further notice. This also extends to the Afcon qualifiers, which resume on Wednesday, 13 November, read a SuperSport statement.

“We are in a difficult position where we cannot broadcast the CAF games when we don’t have a firm contractual arrangement in place. SuperSport had previously acquired these broadcast rights from Lagardere,” commented Joe Heshu, MultiChoice Group Executive for Corporate Affairs.

Caf announced earlier on Friday that it had terminated it’s agreement with Lagardere.

“In 2017, the Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA) found that the Agreement breached Egyptian competition rules because Lagardère was appointed as CAF’s exclusive agent for the marketing and media rights for an uninterrupted 20 year period without any open tender. By the same decision, ECA declared the Agreement null and void and imposed a number of remedies on CAF. Those remedies included the obligation to immediately terminate the Agreement and suspend its effects within the Egyptian market,” read a Caf statement.

“The Economic Courts of Cairo then issued two judgments in 2018-2019 (cases No 397/2017 and No 434/2019) whereby they found the two former CAF officials, the former President, Issa Hayatou, and the former Secretary General, Hicham El Amrani, who signed the Agreement guilty of anti-competitive and fraudulent conduct, and imposed a fine of EGP 500 million on each of them. On appeal, the fine was reduced to EGP 200 million and CAF was held to be jointly liable for the payment of that fine.

“Finally, in 2017, the Competition Commission of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (“CCC”) assessed that the Agreement infringed the CCC Competition Regulations. It recommended the imposition of a financial penalty on CAF and the adoption of certain remedies, including the termination of the Agreement.

“Given the above developments, CAF had no choice but to terminate the Agreement.”

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