Rwanda national football league title sponsors Azam TV have temporarily halted broadcasting of league matches due to contractual issues with the Rwanda Football Federation (FERWAFA), Times Sport has learnt. In 2015, the Tanzanian pay TV rolled out a $2.35m sponsorship deal for the local first division league for five years. After signing the multi-million deal with sponsorship and broadcasting rights, the league was renamed Azam Rwanda Premier League. In the first year, Azam provided $350,000 which increased to $500,000 in each of the following four years. “I cannot say that we have reached a level of ending the agreement completely but Azam TV has stopped to broadcast the league temporarily because there are certain things we don’t agree with FERWAFA,” Azam Rwanda Operations Manager, Faradjallah Ndagano, told Times Sport on Wednesday. He added that, “We are in talks with FERWAFA about our concerns and soon we will come up with an official position, but for now we have taken a decision to stop broadcasting the league until we have addressed everything.” It is reported that Azam TV requested FERWAFA not to go ahead with the league matches last week because their (Azam TV) OB vans were in Kenya covering the just concluded CECAFA Senior Challenge Cup but FERWAFA ignored the request and went ahead with the league, which angered the sponsors. Those league fixtures included; Rayon Sports vs Police FC, Rayon Sports vs Amagaju FC and SC Kiyovu vs Marines—as a result, Azam TV decided not to broadcast match-day 9 fixtures. However, the Spokesperson for FERWAFA, Prosper Ruboneza played down the idea of frosty relations with the league sponsors saying the federation is sorting out the issues. editorial@newtimes.co.rw
