Debutant Botswana face television Black – out in AFCON 2012

• Print PDF

Football fans in Botswana have been denied the chance to watch their country's maiden appearance at next month's Africa Cup of Nations.

This comes after the Botswana government chose not to buy broadcasting rights from the French company; Sport Five claiming that asking price of (US$1.98m) was unrealistic

Budgetary constraints

-1.98 M US$ (Ksh.165.82) minimum for us to have limited terrestrial rights has been judged to be too much. We are undergoing budgetary constraints right now: obviously we budget certain amounts and this hadn't been budgeted for. Government spokesperson Dr. Jeff Ramsay told BBC Sport

This came after negotiations between Sport Five and Botswana's state-owned national broadcaster (Btv), which is a Government Parastatal, broke down.

An alternative for the fans  

Ramsay said that he hoped many football fans would be able to follow the competition through subscriptions to the satellite television network showing games.

The Botswana government is funding the team's ten-day training camp at the Royal Bafokeng Sports Campus in Rustenburg, South Africa.

After the Rustenburg camp, the Zebras will head for a camp on 26 December in Qatar, where they will train at the Aspire Academy at the Government's expense.

The Zebras have been drawn in Group D at the finals alongside Ghana, Mali and Guinea.