Maku Blasts French Firm over AFCON Blackout

Labaran Maku, minister of Information, has lauded Nigeria’s inability to broadcast live matches from the ongoing African Nations Cup in South Africa, saying it was in the interest of sports development in Nigeria and blamed rights owners LC2 of France of high pricing.

Maku also apologised to football fans and Nigerians in general while inspecting work at the Inland River Port in Oguta, Imo state.

He insisted that Nigerians must make up their minds on what they want and accused LC2 of exploitation.

"It is necessary for Nigeria to call their bluff because they were not willing to bring down the price despite efforts by the Broadcasting Organisation of Nigeria (BON). All efforts made by BON through the agent LC2 did not work. From eight million euros, they came to six million then 4.5 million Euro; so you can see that it is not a scientific charge, it is a kind of casino pricing," Maku stated.

The Information minister noted that "BON decided that this year, Nigeria should call the bluff of this agent and maybe next time the Confederation of African Football will be more sensitive when it comes to hiring of agents to vent the broadcasting rights of the African Nations Cup."

The minister said that Nigeria would no longer tolerate agents who would turn the country into a cash cow.

``Nigeria cannot be a cash cow for every agent to come and exploit. We have to call the bluff of people that want to abuse our generosity. We are making this collective sacrifice for a better future. We will work with BON to agree on a new formula for these prices and we will want to see that what we pay should not be different from any other African country,” he noted.

However, the Minister got it on a wrong foot when he stated that telcos in Nigeria would not have advertised on TV because Orange Telecom of France are the title sponsors of the AFCON.

He stated that his ministry was ready to intervene on the crisis but BON advised to the contrary, saying they didn't think it was proper to expend 'public funds' on a purely commercial venture.

"BON advised government not to intervene.They said they will not want the government to use public money to any agent because it is not good to our country and the agent has not treated Nigeria fairly."

On a closing note, Maku assured that Nigerians would get a better deal in 2014.