Johannesburg - The Democratic Alliance (DA) has promised to challenge the South African Tourism Board’s promised sponsorship of English Premier League team Tottenham Hotspur.
On Wednesday, following news that the department was planning to sign a three-year, R910 million partnership with the team, the DA said it was prepared to go as far as visiting the offices of the London team in order to get to the bottom of the matter.
“A delegation from DA Abroad will, this week, go to the Tottenham Hotspur Football Club in London to ascertain exactly what the status of this deal is and if any money has exchanged hands,” the DA said.
The Daily Maverick recently reported that it had seen documents and a PowerPoint presentation detailing the workings of the multimillion sponsorship that would see the department partner with the English football team for 36 months.
Civil organisations, such as Outa, and political parties, including the DA, have called the proposed deal a “slap in the face of all South Africans”, whose hard-earned taxes would be wasted on a vanity project that had no value for ordinary people.
“South African Tourism’s (SAT) plan to sponsor an English Premier League team, Tottenham Hotspur, is a slap in the face of every South African whose hard-earned tax will be used to sponsor a First World football team.
“It is also an insult for the South African tourism and travel sector, which was decimated and, in many cases, completely destroyed during and post-Covid,” the DA said.
On Wednesday, Tourism Minister Lindiwe Sisulu, through her spokesperson Steve Motale, denied having authorised the deal, adding that she was not briefed about it as it was undertaken before her tenure in the tourism portfolio.
Motale said that under normal circumstances, proposals were processed by a project team and sent to the executive committee before being presented to the SA Tourism board.
He added that the board was independent, and the minister did not interfere with the board’s decisions.
“In the previous portfolios Minister Sisulu has served since dawn of democracy, her contribution speaks for itself. Even the Daily Maverick, through its source, indicates that this proposal dates back to 2017, of which the minister held a different portfolio. Essentially, the SAT proposal is to conclude a memorandum of understanding with Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. It is non-binding. Such a proposal must still pass muster within the tourism ministry and is subject to the concurrence of the national Treasury,” Motale said.
DA tourism spokesperson Manny de Freitas said the party would do everything it could to oppose this deal as the country could ill-afford to waste its taxes while reeling from the negative effects of the energy crisis.
“This idea is even worse than the money allocated for the ANC’s comrades in Cuba, an effort that was stopped by Solidarity in the courts. Our country is in a power crisis. Consumers are being crushed by inflation. There is no way the ANC will be able to condone such a decision in the 2024 election, not even among its staunchest supporters,” De Freitas said.
The Star