Sofapaka boss says FKF deal a relief for KPL clubs

Sofapaka chairman Elly Kalekwa says he is excited about the new sponsorship deal for the Kenyan top league and praised Football Kenya Federation (FKF) for going out of their way to ensure clubs are taken care of.

Last week, FKF announced a Sh.1.2b five year deal for the top tier league with a Nigerian betting firm. Under the deal, clubs will get at least Sh8 million per season.

“So far so good. Before this deal, we had nothing and clubs were really suffering and so this is a big relief to us and we fully support the deal,” he said.

Kalekwa said a transitional committee formed last week is currently going through the contract and will advice the clubs fully on its contents but for now he believes they have no problem with changing the name of the league.

“It is really not a big deal to have to change the name of the league. What is important is that clubs get and have money to do their operations like paying players and honoring fixtures. Everything else is secondary.”

Kalekwa however pointed out that the league must be run independently from the association to be able to maintain professionalism.

“We have run the league for many years under the Kenyan Premier League (KPL) and it worked perfectly. Our request is that whatever name we will run the league under going forward, we be able to maintain the sense of independence and professionalism that existed.

“In this day and era, associations do not run the league and we are happy that FKF are keen to maintain the same even with the new arrangement.”

Apart from his role as chairman of Sofapaka, Kalekwa was also chairman of the KPL Marketing Committee.