Mibawa TV secures Bullets rights
Mibawa Television (TV) Station has secured broadcasting rights to beam live Nyasa Big Bullets home matches in the 2019 season following a one-year partnership the two entities signed in Blantyre on Wednesday.
The development means other TV stations will be tapping and buying feeds of Bullets’ home action from Mibawa.
The partnership agreement also stipulates that Bullets will be getting two-thirds of all proceeds from adverts during their games plus an exclusive Nyasa Big Bullets special programme, which will be featured on Mibawa TV every Thursday.
Mibawa TV will also be providing video clips when Bullets players are needed by foreign clubs. The station will also be featuring anything happening at Bullets and showcasing Nyasa Manufacturing Company (NMC) products.
Bullets chief executive officer Fleetwood Haiya said the partnership is part of their commercialisation drive that aims to generate income for the club, apart from gate revenue and sponsorship package from NMC.
“After launching our commercialisation drive recently, we asked a number of television stations to bid for a business partnership with us and out of the four stations that came up, Mibawa emerged the best.
“With this partnership, we have not only expanded our revenue base but also created a platform for our big fan base to follow what is happening at the club,” he said.
Super League of Malawi (Sulom) general secretary Williams Banda welcomed Bullets’ partnership with Mibawa, but said there is a need for clarification on the exclusivity of the deal.
“Much as we welcome this partnership, we cannot comment much as of now because we have not yet accessed the partnership agreement and the memorandum of understanding [MoU] to appreciate the exclusivity of the deal as regards the dos and the don’ts as per Sulom regulations,” he said.
When asked if the idea of beaming their games live would not be in conflict with the broadcast rights with Sulom, Haiya claimed that they have only targeted home games because rights for such matches belong to a home side.
“We will soon make a thorough clarification at Sulom Annual General Meeting [AGM] about this partnership,” he said.
In spite of that, Mibawa TV owner John Nthakomwa yesterday clarified that this does not mean they have completely shut doors for other clubs as they will be having their normal schedule of covering other matches.
“We would like to clarify that the exclusive agreement between Bullets and Mibawa is for a TV magazine programme. The concept is exclusive and cannot be replicated for any other client. We can develop other concepts for other clients as long as they are not in conflict with that of Bullets,” he said.
“However, coverage of live football games and concepts that are not in conflict with Bullets’ idea are not exclusive.” n
