Six major South African businesses will officially back the 2010 Soccer World Cup in South Africa, the local organising committee announced in Pretoria on Wednesday.
First National Bank has already announced that it will sponsor the soccer extravaganza to the tune of $30-million (about R212,7-million).
A second company is expected to announce its sponsorship on Thursday, committee CEO Danny Jordaan revealed after a meeting between President Thabo Mbeki and Business Unity South Africa (Busa) at the Union Buildings.
He would not disclose the name of the company ahead of its announcement.
Jordaan said the value of the companies’ sponsorships will not be the same, with different distributions of cash and in-kind components.
He said Fifa’s sponsorship programme consists of five tiers, the highest being for six global corporations, including Coca-Cola, Adidas and Visa. The next tier is for 2010 World Cup sponsors, including major multinationals such as McDonald’s and Budweiser.
The third tier is for national support and will consist only of South African companies. Small enterprises and the second economy will have an opportunity to participate in the fourth and fifth tiers, which concern licensed products including caps, T-shirts and memorabilia.
”This World Cup must be a World Cup for all of our people,” he said.
In Germany, $3-million (about R21,27-million) of the total budget went into the stadiums, but more than $8-million (about R56,72-million) went into the fan parks, where people with concessions generated almost 10 times the profit of those in the stadiums,” said Jordaan.
There were constraints inside the stadiums because of the exclusivity Fifa had to guarantee its major sponsors.
Jordaan said the fundamental argument behind not granting Africa the contest in the past 100 years was that it would not generate the same returns for Fifa as Europe did.
One of the reasons it was placed behind Germany in 2000 was the idea that sufficient revenue would be generated in Germany ”to protect Fifa against possible losses in South Africa”.
However, Fifa has already succeeded in meeting its $3-billion (about R21,27-billion) budget for 2007 to 2010, incorporating the 2010 World Cup — the highest revenue in the 100-year period, he said.
It has $3,1-billion (about R21,78-billion) in the kitty so far, mainly from major global corporate sponsors and broadcasting deals — and with broadcasting deals yet to be concluded in Asia, Africa and South America.
Fifa’s budget for 2003 to 2007, incorporating the 2006 World Cup, is $1,8-billion (about R12,76-billion).
The issue behind a negative perception of South Africa’s ability to hold the event is the ”unreasonable” comparison of Germany in 2006 with South Africa in 2006, when it should more appropriately be compared with Germany 2002, he said.
”Do we have challenges? Of course we do,” he acknowledged.
The construction of stadiums has to be tackled, as should transport.
Jordaan pointed out that even when it comes to transport, comparisons have to take into account the huge challenges that had existed in countries like the United States, where enormous distances and time zones had to be covered between stadiums, and the Koreas, where there had been different monetary systems and visa requirements with which to contend.
He has been working with Fifa on South Africa’s challenges since 1994, said Jordaan, adding: ”We will deal with all of those challenges. Fundamentally, we are still determined to deliver an African World Cup that will be world class. There is no contradiction between being African and being world class.”
Also present at Wednesday’s Busa working group meeting were Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Minister in the Presidency Essop Pahad, Minister of Trade and Industry Mandisi Mpahlwa, Busa president Patrice Motsepe and its chairperson, Bobby Godsell.
Other issues addressed were progress on achieving unity in the business sector; Busa activities, particularly its support of small, medium and micro enterprises; broad-based black economic empowerment; the Doha trade negotiations; and crime. — Sapa