By Mark Baber
August 4 – The Ghana Football Association (GFA) end-of season awards ceremony has been cancelled by the GFA due to the non-payment of sponsorship funds by Globacom (Glo), the League’s main sponsor, whose contract is currently due for renewal.
Ibrahim Saane Daara, Communications Director of the GFA, spoke to local media (LINK: http://www.citifmonline.com/index.php?id=1.1471371 ) saying, “The association has decided to cancel the awards ceremony. It was supposed to be the icing on the cake for our sponsors, but as things stand now, they have not paid any monies to us.
”As a result, we are cash strapped and we will not be able to fund the event so we have decided to call it off.”
The awards ceremony had been due to be held in the State Banquet Hall in Accra, with Mahatma Otoo of Accra Hearts of Oak and Kumasi Asante Kotoko Head Coach Mas Ud Didi Dramani expected to win the best player and the coach of the year.
Ibrahim Saane Daara said Glo had been informed of the situation but not replied, a worrying development for the GFA which is heavily dependent on funding from Globacom and for the Premier League club each of which is reportedly owed in the region of GH¢150,000 ($70,000).
Glo Mobile Ghana contracted a five-year sponsorship deal with the Ghana Premier League in December 2008, until the end of the 2013/14 season. However the execution of the agreement has been marked by regular delays in payments.
The company recently received awards for being the fastest growing telecoms network in Ghana, acquiring one million subscribers within 90 days of operation and 2.47 million subscribers within 14 months a remarkable success in a saturated market largely attributed to the award-winning ‘Glo Billing 5’ promo, a tariff plan giving customers five times usage credit for the value of every recharge.
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