First Division South chairman, Tariq Babitseng, has called on clubs to give their soon-to-be-revealed sponsor due respect and avoid controversy. After several years without a sponsor, the Northern and Southern Divisions will reportedly receive P6m in the next three years from the Debswana Diamond Company.
The new sponsor is expected to be launched soon as both the Botswana Football Association (BFA) and Debswana are still finalizing the finer details of the sponsorship.
“It’s a great feeling that finally we have managed to secure a sponsor for both divisions. This would improve the performance of clubs in our divisions because the clubs have been taking a lot of strain playing without financial reward. Our sponsorship, we’re going to propose to the association, that we want it to be in the form of monthly grants to help run the clubs because we no longer want to hear that some teams failed to honour games. This would mean that all the clubs in our divisions should have active (bank) accounts,” he said.
In the past seasons, some clubs, especially in the north, failed to travel to some of their games citing money to travel as a handicap. According to sources, it took a lot of convincing to secure the sponsorship for the division which has attracted lots of controversy over the years.
Babitseng appealed to the clubs to give the sponsor respect as that would ensure that they continue backing both divisions.
“The clubs have been pushing us (committee) to find a sponsor and I believe they will adhere to the conditions of the sponsorship and do their level best to give it the necessary mileage. It would be suicidal for the clubs if we’d lose the sponsorship because of negative publicity in our leagues,” he continued.
Meanwhile, First Division South is expected to kick off on September 8 not on September 1 as has been initially planned. Following the announcement that Notwane would not be taking part in the Southern division next season, Babitseng said that their space would be filled.  A play-off match would be played on Saturday at a neutral venue.
