Professional Football: Can the League be salvaged

The Professional Football League has been in financial difficulties since the beginning of the season.

The alarm bell was rung by the Secretary General of the League, Pauline Manguele, who says there is the risk of a halt in the league one and two championships should nothing be done to remedy the situation. This is rather paradoxical given the fact that the Professional League was supposed to be financially autonomous by now as the government was supposed to support the League only for three years after which it was going to be autonomous.

With money coming in from government subventions, grants from Fecafoot and proceeds from the official sponsor at the time, MTN, the League lay on their laurels and failed to seek other avenues to generate revenue.

With the withdrawal of MTN as sponsor of the league one and two championships, the Professional League became heavily dependent on government subventions as sole source of revenue. Even at the inception the League had some financial difficulties in that the subvention from government is destined to pay players salaries in clubs while the grant from Fecafoot is to help in the technical organization of the championships and not for the functioning of the league.

The situation pushed the president of the League, General Pierre Semengue, to approach the presidency of the republic for assistance and the president of the republic, Paul Biya, gave a special and additional grant to help cover the running cost of the League.

Since then, efforts to enable the Professional League to become financially autonomous have been futile. A contract with an independent marketing firm charged with seeking sponsors for the League was terminated due to absence of results. Even tax exoneration for companies that invest in football negotiated by the League, has not been enough incentives to get companies interested in sponsoring the Professional League. The League however managed to sign a contract with an Italian sports equipment company which will not only provide jerseys to League one and Two clubs but also sponsor a super cup between the League champions and cup winners as well as organized friendly matches with between Cameroonian and Italian clubs.

However, the deal doesn’t inject any fresh blood in the Professional League as there are no direct financial fallouts as certain provisions of the deal need to be co-financed by Garman and the Professional League.

Another source of revenue for the League and clubs is through gate takings but even here, turn out in stadiums is very poor despite efforts made by the League to encourage spectators to attend matches. Raffles draws were made on the basis on entry tickets with motorcycles up for grab as prize. Besides the poor turn-out, proceeds from gate takings are not properly managed as counterfeit tickets are either up for sale or people bride their way through for lesser than the cost price of entry tickets.

The League this year has received only a meager sum of FCFA 200 million from State subventions and FCFA 400 million from Fecafoot which is not enough to foot the increasing bills of the Professional League. With Cameroon to host the 2016 Women’s AFCON and 2019 AFCON, the some stadiums in the country will be closed for renovation works.

These stadiums include the Ahmadou Ahidjo stadium in Yaounde, the Reunification stadium in Douala and the Roumdé Adja stadium in Garoua. This means, the League will have to look for other pitches of play and this is going to induce an additional cost. For instance, to organize a match at the CAF Excellence centre in Mbankomo cost FCF400.000. More, so, in the absence of a field to rent, the League will have to renovate other secondary stadiums which can host the championship matches.

At the same time the League will have to meet up with certain running costs such as paying referees and other match officials. As the secretary General of the League said, if money is not urgently injected into the League, there risk being a suspension in the championships or poor organization and match fixing on the part of referees. A stitch in time saves nine.