This year’s CECAFA Kagame Cup is unlikely to be played, Soka25east.com can reveal. The regional clubs’ competition, as well as the Senior Challenge Cup (for national teams) was scheduled for November and December respectively in Kenya, but to this end, there are no signs this will happen any soon.
So why is this so, despite numerous assurances from CECAFA Secretary General Nicholas Musonye that Kagame Cup will indeed be hosted this year in his home country Kenya?
An inside source from the organisation, which did not want to be mentioned, is alleging “sabotage”, and not lack of funds to stage the annual tournament, as has been previously cited.
At the center of the stalemate, the source reveals is the television rights for the two championships, which South Africa based pay television giants “DSTV/Supersport” currently holds, and which Tanzania’s “Azam TV” is salivating for.
Azam holds media rights for Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda top leagues, while DSTV/Supersport has monopoly over Kenya’s.
Good number of federation presidents in the regional, the source explains, will only host the tournament if Azam TV is given the deal, all in a “grand scheme” to edge out DSTV/Supersport.
Football Kenya Federation is yet to write a letter committing to host this year’s showpiece. They recently reignited their botched partnership with MP&SILVA, a sports rights distribution company, handing them rights for Kenya Cup, previously with “GoTV”, a subsidiary of Multi Choice, which also owns DSTV/Supersport, hence clipping their wings in the Kenyan football scene.
Tanzania staged the last edition of Kagame Cup in 2015, in which hosts Azam FC beat Kenya’s Gor Mahia 2-0 in the final to be crowned champions for the first time, all the matches were exclusively beamed live on DSTV/Supersport.
The other issue at play is control over CECAFA secretariat, which Kenya hosts in Nairobi. With expected FIFA funding, a section of the FA heads “were heard” in Cairo, Egypt, during the CAF congress in September, calling for relocation of the center of power.
The Senior Challenge Cup will most likely be staged in Sudan, a territory where DSTV/Supersport does not operate in.
