By Isaac Salima:
In a bid to address sponsorship woes, Minister of Youth, Sports and Culture Francis Phiso Thursday held a first ever consultative meeting with officials from some companies at Ryalls Hotel in Blantyre.
The parties discussed a number of issues concerning sports sponsorship.
Phiso said the meeting was important as it enabled him to interact with stakeholders and discuss pertinent issues.
“We had an opportunity to interact with our current sponsors and at the same time trying to woo other companies into sports sponsorship. We have come out of the meeting well informed as the participants expressed some challenges they are facing. We will also conduct similar exercise in Mzuzu and Lilongwe and later on we will strategise on the way forward,” he said.
Phiso further assured that he will ensure that issues raised were addressed as the government was keen at attracting companies into sports sponsorship.
Representatives of companies such as Nyasa Manufacturing, FDH and National Bank of Malawi attended the meeting where they raised issues affecting sports sponsorship, the need to have and implement national sports policy, mismanagement of funds, heavy taxes on sponsorship funds and mediocre management of associations.
In his presentation, Director of Sports in the ministry Jameson Ndalama highlighted the status of sports sponsorship, government’s position and plans for sports development, why sports sponsorship is important and benefits of sponsorships to sponsors and partners.
Nyasa Manufacturing Managing Director, Fleetwood Haiya, hailed the ministry for organising the meeting.
“It was a very important meeting and we pray that this should not be the last one. At the end of the day we should make sports win. When companies go into sports sponsorship, what they want are profits so what we are asking is among others, to have policies that attract sponsors like tax incentives,” Haiya said.
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