The Citizen (Dar es Salaam)
Majuto Omary
24 June 2008
The Taifa Stars-Cameroon first leg for the 2010 African Nations/World Cup qualifier clash grossed Sh505,211,000, the Tanzania Football Federation (TFF) announced yesterday.
The match played at the New National Stadium in Dar es Salaam on June 14 had about Sh30 million collected from television rights and Sh2,333,000 as parking fees, a TFF statement indicated.
The revenue breakdown as released by TFF secretary general Fredrick Mwakalebela shows that 432 tickets of Sh50,000 each were sold at the VIP A block of seats to gross Sh21.6 million.
Unsold tickets were 315. Sh77.92 million was collected from 1,948 spectators who paid tickets priced at Sh40,000 for VIP B seats, where about 2,212 tickets were unsold.
Gate collections from orange seats reached Sh83.6 million, from 4,180 spectators parting with Sh20,000 for a ticket, with 4,536 tickets unsold.
A collection of Sh289, 758,000 resulted from tickets sold at orange curved stand block of seats, about 7,239 tickets sold at Sh10,000 each.
The blue stand had 17,024 tickets sold at Sh7,000 each, while the green stand had 19,640 tickets sold at Sh,5000 each.
Mwakalebela expressed his appreciation for a superb job done by the committee that supervised the match.
He said the committee was disappointed by unruly fans who failed to observe their ticket numbers, inconveniencing other fans during the match.
"'We are very sorry that bonafide spectators were disturbed by a few unscrupulous fans who failed to respect others during the match.
We are working on ways to solve the problem permanently in the future," he said.
Seven people were arrested in for possession of counterfeit tickets during the match.
They are currently under police custody pending court appearance on fraud charges, he said.
Vingunguti Primary School teacher Cleophas Ruta (40) was arrested for failure to timely submit Sh12.2 million from sold tickets. Ruta is also a scout instructor.
The first leg match ended in barren draw with the continent's top rated side, Cameroon.
Taifa Stars ended the first four matches out of the scheduled six with two points to crash out of the African Nations/World Cup 2010 qualifiers.
The Stars group is led by the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon with ten points while Cape Verde has nine.
Mauritius has a single point, and like Taifa Stars are now eliminated.
If Stars won their last fixtures, they attain a total eight points, a poor third.
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