Collaboration by Next TV and the League Management Company in a $220 in the Nigerian Professional Football League promises to address the yearnings of stakeholders and football fans across the country. SEGUN OGUNJIMI reports.
The broadcast partnership for the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL) was unveiled in Abuja on Tuesday, November 12 by the League Management Company (LMC) and Next Digital Television. The deal, estimated to be in the region of $220 million, was sealed with the top officials of the LMC and Next Digital TV, 9Mobile on ground at the Maitama, Abuja office of the League Management Company.
Prince Ado Ibrahim, the Chairman, Next TV, said the business is seeking to connect the younger generation of Nigerians to the NPFL through their portable smart devices.
Unlike others before it, the project is being sponsored by a Nigerian company to bridge a gap in football promotion in Nigerian. The project, which will start with about three matches, will eventually spread to all ten matches every MatchDay.
On what informed the decision to partner the NPFL, the Next TV boss said that the league is one Nigerian product that has been underutilised. “We are not hoarding this content. We are talking with networks. We are taking Nigerian league to the Middle East hence the involvement of Samsson, a Dubai tech company that is represented at this event,” Ibrahim said.
At the event, Next TV also officially signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with mobile telecommunications company, 9Mobile making them the official carrier for the contents on OTT.
Represented by Layi Onafowokan, the Acting Marketing Director at 9Mobile, the company said it has a goal to make watching the NPFL affordable and convenient and would thus be offering specialised data packages and bundles for subscribers to the project.
He said the partnership is proudly Nigerian and that as a company now fully owned by Nigerians, with Nigerian investors, it will be catering for Nigerians.
“We don’t want the youths of our country idling away on social media doing the wrong things. We want to get them engaged in the NPFL which has skilled talents,” Onafowokan said.
Businesses and organisations represented at the event included WEMA Bank, First Bank and the Nigeria Investment Promotions Commission (NIPC).
The LMC boss, Mallam Shehu Dikko who supervises the 20-team Nigeria Professional Football League, disclosed to The Nation the reason behind brokering the deal and what benefits it has for Nigeria’s football league and economy.
Dikko said, “So far so good. After a long period we have seen the light at the end of the tunnel with a very big opportunity to have a very big commercial big position on the table which is a big thing. This shows that regardless of other issues, people still believe in what we are doing. People can still key in into our vision and we are just starting.
“You know that TV (Television) is the heart beat of every sport. The revenue that comes from TV, the promotions that come from TV and other financial incentives derivable from TV by clubs is massive. For a very long time, we keep saying that if you don’t solve the issue of TV then we cannot go anywhere. What people failed to understand is that even in those days when we have the TV (rights) for example, we were doing only one game and maximum of two a week. In exceptional circumstances we were doing three based on double header.”
According to him, seven of 10 games have already been wasted, stressing that that is not the right place to go. The new project, he said, would find a way to put all local games on TV in the right way, with the right quality, the right development before being sold.
“For many years, we have been saying it in the English Premier League. It is not the TV networks that are covering the EPL matches. There are specialised companies that are doing that. It is not the TV networks that are producing La Liga (the Spanish elite League) or Bundesliga (German elite League). Somebody has to produce this game and then put it on the plate and you sell across the networks and commercialised it and make your money.
“Now we won’t be able to achieve that because we keep running in circles. For instance, if I go today and sign a contract with a TV network, they give me some money and show only one or two matches a week. It’s not worth it, that is like running in circles.
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“That was since 2017 when we had a hitch with our former sponsor. We had to go back to the drawing board because we had to resolve the fundamental issue of production. If you don’t produce the games, control the content and sell it across board, you are just running in circles. Production is very costly. Everybody has seen what happened with the Nigeria versus Republic of Benin game in the 2021 AFCON qualifiers in Uyo. The NTA had to go at the last minute to rectify the situation. But look at what happened, even the people that produced that game could not buy that content themselves. Everybody in Nigeria was complaining but nobody was thinking of how to solve it.”
Dikko said every country has definitive production platforms which they use for production and sell it across board. He added that that is what his organisation had been doing all alone until the appointment of the present Sports Minister (Sunday Dare) who he said, has been identifying with their efforts. The Minister, he continued, understands what his group has been trying to do and has continued to give support. According to him, there is active understanding and collaboration on the part of the Minister.
In a lengthen narrative, Dikko said, “If you go to the EPL after their games you can see that the EPL handles production, they have an outfit that produces their games and they sell it across the world and make money so also is the LaLiga in Spain and German Bundsliga too. So why can’t we have something like that in Nigeria too? That’s why we left it. It is not just about the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL) if we have a decent production company that can produce these games in Nigeria and put it on the networks and it can be on NTA, be on Super Sports, Star Times and can be everywhere that revenue will come and the rights will come and the money will come too, all sports would benefit, and everybody will make plenty money. Once you are on TV you have to ensure that the venues too are good because everybody will see it. Everything will just snowball into real economy. That is what the League Management Company has been working on in the last two years.
“Remember we signed an MOU with the Nigeria Television Authority to see if we can take over their equipment and find the partners and sponsors that can help us upgrade them (the equipments and human resources) and bring them up to high level standard and develop them across the country but I can tell you to produce one game the way it is now cost a huge amount of money. Ask even the clubs that plays the CAF Champions League, for every match thy play in that Champions League, CAF deducts about $30,000 to $40,000 from their money for the production alone. This means producing a match alone will cost between N12 million to N15 million.
“So if you don’t have a company to reduce that cost and get the right equipment to get things done the right way it will be very difficult to achieve this lofty aim. So that is what we are doing right now with the new deal we are bringing on board. We are working now with Next Digital TV. Its first and foremost he issue of investment in the league, issue of production, and then the issue of commercializing the content. There are four steps that we are looking at and the issue of getting a lot of sponsors into the league. Basically that is what we are working on right now. The moment we that we will now have our games across board. Thankfully, in the last two year we have worked with the right channels in the government and the government is doing their own part. They are putting the right legislations and regulations that will drive and protect this process. Once we can produce these matches and the market is there definitely the revenues will come with the right advertisement.
“We have our focus, our target in the next five (5) years if we get it right at least we should realize a minimum of $220 million. That is the focus and target but that depends on certain variables if we get it right. If we get it right we might even surpass or double that. We discussed that with our (20) clubs and everybody have seen the business plan and everybody is backing it up and so we have to create the enabling environment to get it done. I can’t stop giving praises to the Honourable Minister of Sports Sunday Dare for always being proactive and backing everything up. The NFF President is always positive about things like this and the 20 clubs that made up the league are all working towards making this process work and succeed”.
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