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Getahun Mela, 23, a high school drop-out who
resides in his modestly sized room in Saris
where he grew up, makes his living with the
income he generates showing Western soccer
matches on weekends. In a shanty house he
inherited from his parents in the same
locality, commonly called a DStv house among
the youth, avid fans come to cheer on their
favourite clubs.
His revenue booms in winter when the English
Premier League and the Spanish La Lega are
broadcast live, not to mention the German
Bundesliga and the Italian Serie. Getahun's
DStv house fetches around 600 Br a week when
there is a soccer match involving the teams
coveted by Addis fans like Manchester
United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool.
However, his revenue may be in jeopardy, as
a recent market snatch by GTV, the pay-TV
operator based in London, in which it
grabbed the exclusive rights to broadcast
the English Premier League in Africa, has
cast doubts on the continuity of DStv house
income as the new operator has yet to
acquire an agent in Ethiopia.
As the contract between the English Premier
League and any particular pay-TV must be
renewed every three years, the former floats
a tender to award broadcasting rights of the
Barclays Premier League, the world’s leading
football competition, to providers that
submit the highest offers. Multi Choice,
service provider of Digital Satellite
Television (DStv) of South Africa; and Arab
Radio and Television (ART), which had
commanded the broadcast rights in the past
three seasons in sub-Saharan African
countries as well as in Asia and the Middle
East, have now been beaten by out by GTV and
Showtime respectively.
Henceforth, soccer fans in Ethiopia, who had
enjoyed a series of Premier League matches
from DStv and ART, will now have to resort
to alternative stations which are no where
to be found. The geography of being close to
the Middle East countries had given Ethiopia
the privilege of lying within the radius of
ART's coverage, which enabled it to have
access to such sporting events broadcast by
Dubai based networks.
The coming Premiership season, however, will
be a different story as the League awarded
the exclusive rights to GTV and another
popular network, Showtime Arabia, on July 4,
2007, for broadcasting 296 of its 380
matches.
GTV won a three-year license spanning from
August 2007 to May 2010, enabling it to
broadcast 10 live matches per week in 48
sub-Saharan African countries. The service
of this company, which will have the right
to broadcast 80pc of all matches, is
provided by Gateway Broadcast Service (GBS),
a subsidiary of Gateway Communications, and
the leading provider of communication
services to telecom operators and
corporations in Africa.
The other pay-TV station that won the
exclusive broadcast rights in Asia and the
Middle East, Showtime, is owned by Gulf DTH,
a joint venture company of KIPCO, Kuwati's
largest private sector investment company
with more than 15 billion dollars capital,
and Viacom. The network is one of the
leading global entertainment content
companies, offering programmes and content
for television, motion pictures and digital
platforms.
The concern of Getahun and other DStv house
owners in the metropolis rests on
difficulties they will be facing to meet the
demands of the captivated soccer fans in the
Premier League that kicked-off yesterday as
GTV did not undertake preparations to
broadcast matches in Ethiopia.
The subsistence of most of these DStv house
owners depends on the two to three Birr they
collect from soccer spectators that are
glued to the TV set every weekend inside the
often packed houses. However, the lives of
these people is at stake as DStv will
broadcast only 84 of the 380 matches, while
ART will not have the right to put on the
air any game whatsoever live. This boils
down to a reduction in the income generated
by DSTV houses by at least 75pc as they can
only have access to a single game per week
as opposed to 10 games in the previous
seasons.
It is estimated that there are over 3,000
DStv house owners only in Addis Abeba, which
collectively secure over nine million Birr a
month. Individuals who rely on incomes
brought by the small sized halls for their
survival consider the recent news tragic
that will cost them the bread they win for
their families and themselves.
"With no other extra income, I do not know
how I would finance my weak mother and six
other households that rely on my revenue,"
said Taye Tilahun, owner of one of the DStv
houses in Merkato.
Taye earns up to 600 Br a week from his DStv
house subscribing to DStv and ART. But now
he is not sure whether he will even get 100
Br a week with the 84 Premier League games
broadcast by the South African pay-TV.
Multi Choice Ethiopia charges its 6,000
subscribers all over the country 59 dollars
per month for subscription. Sources told
Fortune that 1,500 subscribers have
already terminated service with Multi Choice
and the company fears more losses are to
come.
"Though Multi Choice offered an amount four
times higher than its previous offer, it
could not win," Gelila Woldemichael,
president of Multi Choice Ethiopia, told
Fortune.
When the Premier League was established in
1992, the United Kingdom's (UK) pay-TV
operator, Sky Television, was awarded the
broadcast rights for live games in a deal
worth 362 million dollars over five seasons.
Pay television was a new concept and
charging people to watch football matches
had never been done before.
But Sky hit the jackpot when it snapped up
the Premier League. Along with its increase
in subscribers to its service came an
increase in advertising revenue, which
initiated pay-TV stations to fend off each
other from snatching the most prized asset,
broadcasting the Premier League games.
Soccer is a powerful commodity. It is
because advertisers covet the huge audience
that the biggest brands in the world spend
millions of dollars sponsoring or
associating their name with the game. And it
is also the reason why television networks
fork out hundreds of millions for the
broadcast rights to show the games.
Guaranteed viewers mean premium rates for
advertising spots.
The media hype, related advertising and
promotion that surround the Premier League
can turn the most apathetic person into a
nut who would move heaven and earth not to
miss the sparkling displays of athleticism
in the match.
Just a year ago, vast numbers of soccer fans
were huddled around a television in a café,
restaurant, bar or the popular DStvhouses
watching the Premiership.
However, some supporters who are mourning
over their future without the League's big
games consider this year's pre-season news
depressing as much as Getahun and Taye who
are agonising with the expectations of a
probable drop in their income.
Ashebir Tessema, who works in the Addis
Abeba Customs Authority, is a staunch
supporter of Arsenal. He belongs to the
group of people who consider soccer part of
their life. Frustrated by the talk of the
town that there will not be the usual live
soccer broadcast anymore, he argues that a
miracle would happen that will enable him to
not miss a single game that Arsenal plays.
"I do not think I can live without
football," he told Fortune. "I wish I
could stop being a fan of soccer, but I
cannot."
Ashebir represents a number of devotees in
Ethiopia whose mouth only speaks of teams
like Manchester, Arsenal, Liverpool and
Chelsea which compete for trophies every
season. Overwhelmed by the disappointments
of football fans, Ethiopian Television (ETV)
has promised to pick up some of the slack,
which somewhat calmed the fire on the side
of the spectators.
Habte Gemeda, advertising and production
department head at ETV, told Fortune
that the station would broadcast at least
one match a week, if not more.
It has been almost six years since soccer
has become a way of life for the youth.
There are times where every single
individual you come across on the street
argues about 'their' team's quality. There
are, however, others who for some reason
consider the soccer-obsessed fans as
lunatics who never care about their own
country's affairs, including the local
soccer clubs. But, the fact remains on the
ground that even some elders who watch
soccer in the small shanty houses found in
every corner of the city shout at the
players as if they are in the pitch. Now, it
is likely that these crazy fans will turn
their faces to their homes and crowd
together before their TVs.
Reminiscing on the juicy years he spent
until the last Premiership season, Getahun
is of the opinion that ETV's compassion to
the spectators who are eagerly waiting for
the kick-off of the coming season is yet
another pain. He thinks that even the small
number of fans that would come to his place
of business will now watch the game at their
homes, causing him to loose the meagre
income he had hoped to rely on.
Not all owners of DStvhouses are sitting at
home folding their hands. Hunting
alternatives, some are thinking of resorting
to using illegally smuggled Showtime cards
that are claimed to have come from Dubai.
Still, others are hopefully expecting the
good news that the satellite based pay-TV,
GTV, may come up with an agent as it did in
Kenya early in August this year. However,
GTV, who won a landmark deal in broadcasting
the Barclay's Premier League, did not enter
the country and has yet to announce its
plans for broadcasting.
Mulatu Agumasu, license and inspection
director at the Ethiopian Telecommunications
Agency (ETA), told Fortune that to
date only Multi Choice Ethiopia has the
exclusive license in the country.
"I have no knowledge about GTV's plans,"
said Mulatu.
Based in South Africa, DStv is a
multi-channel digital satellite TV service
which covers Africa. It was launched in
1995, and was introduced in Ethiopia the
following year by Multi Choice Ethiopia. It
is a service that has 50 television and 40
audio channels that broadcast live sport
coverage, news, documentaries, movies and
entertainment programmes. Over the past
decade, DStv has become a phenomenon of its
own, a kind of household name.
"I have no choice but to subscribe to the
DStv card for three months and see what it
may bring," said Getahun. "If its revenue
turns out to be bad, as I am sure it will, I
will sell my TV and decoder, renovate the
house and turn it into a café."
Hussein Abdulkeni, editor of Inter Sport, a
local sports newspaper, and Dawit Nigussie,
a sport journalist and talk sport host on
ETV 2, told Fortune that there is no
other option but to depend on ETV for the
major games that DStv will miss.
Nejiba Hule, deputy head of ART Ethiopia,
disclosed to Fortune that they would
broadcast the Premier League games 24 hours
after they are played.
But fans will no more have access to the
highest quality analysis from an in-studio
team of veteran continental television
personalities, including several prominent
former sports stars such as Gary Bailey,
Kalusha Bwalya, Abedi Pelé and Sean
Bartlett.
In spite of the looming feeling of
disappointment, ETV's promise and ART's
day-after broadcast vow, are hailed by many
as providers of an opportunity to watch the
sensational and talented players of the
world that glitter the English Premier
League.
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