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StarTimes, Supersport tussle over airing of Harambee Stars game


Pay TV channels Supersport and StarTimes are locked in a battle over the airing of Harambee Stars matches.

Of immediate concern is Saturday’s Africa Nations Championship clash pitting Kenya against Ethiopia in Nairobi.

While unveiling a half a billion shillings five year deal with StarTimes to air national football team matches on Thursday, Football Kenya Federation boss Sam Nyamweya revealed he is in talks with the Confederation of African Football to acquire rights for StarTimes to air some competitive continental games including the Kenya vs Ethiopia game.

However, Supersport, which is a competitor to StarTimes, has announced it will broadcast live the same match to its audience, citing a separate arrangement with Caf who are the exclusive rights owners for this and all its competitions.

“The federation has goofed on this one again. They do not have the rights to continental games and they know that as much. All rights were signed off to Caf by the respectively member federations and the Kenya FA has even been receiving monies for this,” a source who is privy to this subject told Nairobi News.

Failure by StarTimes to show this clash between the Harambee Stars and Walya Antelopes could immediately constitute a breach of contract by FKF, barely two days since this deal with times.

Harambee Stars need to defeat the Walya Antelopes by three clear goals to erase a two goal defeat suffered in the reverse fixture played away two weeks ago, and progress to the next phase of this competition which is a preserve of home based players only.