Egypt’s Sports Minister, Taher Abu-Zaid, has ordered the council of the Egyptian Football Union not to sell the broadcasting rights for the country’s Premier League to Al-Jazeera Sport Channel.
Officials in the Football Union are now facing an embarrassing situation because the memorandum of conditions does not include any term that precludes Al-Jazeera from buying broadcasting rights.
The memorandum gives the right to any satellite channel or any marketing company to buy such rights.
Political relations between Egypt and Qatar have been strained since the military coup in Egypt in early July. The underlying reason behind this has been the anti-coup stance of the Qatari owned Al-Jazeera station.
Two weeks ago, the Egyptian state TV violated the broadcasting rights of Al-Jazeera when it aired the football game between Egypt and Ghana without referring to Al-Jazeera, which has the exclusive rights.
Interestingly, before becoming sports minister, Taher Abu-Zaid was himself a prominent sport analyst for Al-Jazeera Sport.