The Ghana Football Association (GFA) has expressed shock at the position of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) on the Television Broadcast Rights granted to StarTimes by the GFA, at the end of the bidding process.
“The GFA is shocked by the deliberate misinformation in the statement of GBC and wishes to respond with the facts,” a statement from the FA on Thursday said.
The statement said on December 5, 2019, the GFA issued a statement to invite bids from media organisations for television broadcast rights for its competitions or any combination of its competitions. (Premier League, Division One League, Women’s Premier League, FA Cup and Women’s FA Cup).
It said the deadline for submission of bid was 5pm on Tuesday December 10, 2019.
At the end of the bid deadline, GBC had submitted two different bids made up of the first bid which was for Free To Air TV – Exclusive Media Rights, Digital Rights and Radio Rights for the territory of Ghana for four years at a proposed fee of GH¢8,800,000 (GH¢2,200,000 per season) for all the five GFA Competitions named above.
It said the second bid was for Exclusive Media Rights for Ghana and Global for four years at a proposed fee of GH¢10,200,000 (GH¢2,550,000 per season) and a fee of GH¢200,000 for radio (GH¢50,000 per season) for all the five competitions.
The statement said GBC’s bid also had conditions attached to the bid; among them a revenue share on any Title Sponsorship that the GFA secured for its competitions (GBC wanted 20 per cent share).
It said the GFA Bid Evaluation Team had a meeting with GBC and informed them that none of the two bids they submitted met the valuation of the GFA. At that same meeting, GBC was told they were third in the GFA’s valuation.
However, the GFA, in light of that, has made the highlights of the Ghana Premier League and the FA Cup non exclusive in order for GBC to benefit from it.
The statement explained that it was at that meeting that the GBC representatives indicated that they would consult their bosses and revert to the GFA.
It said on January 2, 2020, GBC emailed a third and fourth bid (note that these were long after the deadline of the bidding period which ended at 5p.m. on December 10, 2019). The late bid was as follows:
That the third bid (out of time) was for Exclusive FTA and Digital Rights for Ghana and Global for four years for a proposed fee of GH¢ 12,000,000 (GH¢3,000,000 per season) for all five GFA competitions with condition to have a share in GFA Title Sponsorship (30 per cent for GBC).
“The fourth bid (out of time) was for an exclusive television and digital rights for Ghana and Global for four years for GH¢25,080,000 (GH¢ 6,270,000 per season) for Ghana Premier League and FA Cup with a condition to have a share of Title Sponsorship if the GFA secured one (30 per cent share for GBC).
”It must be stated unequivocally that evaluation of bids is not only about the financials but includes all conditions, such as those GBC stated in their proposal, such as the 30 per cent share GBC wanted on all Title Sponsorships.”
It said “of utmost importance is the fact that the net value of the bid of GBC was actually lower than the amount quoted in the bid because of the proposed revenue share of Title Sponsorship (eg. should we activate that clause on the MTN FA Cup Title Sponsorship amount).
It said “even if only financials alone were considered, the fourth bid of GBC (which was out of time) was not the bid with the highest financial consideration. Two other proposals were higher than the GBC bids but other conditions (due diligence) affected those bids.
“The GFA, having gone out of its way to make the highlights show non-exclusive for the benefit of all television stations, does not deserve the deliberate misinformation issued by GBC.”
The FA assured that the evaluation conducted on the bid was very thorough and was strictly in compliance with the deadline issued to the Ghanaian public and the world at large. –GFA.org
