Officials met with GICAM to explore avenues for cooperation to boost the finances of the league.

In order to meet up with the huge financial demands of establishing a professional league in Cameroon, officials of the League recently met with the network of Cameroon business people, GICAM, to explore avenues for sponsoring in exchange for visibility through the league activities.Speaking on the occasion, the president of the League, General Pierre Semengue, said the league was faced with problems such as lack of infrastructure, health care for footballers, transportation difficulties and paying handsome salaries to players. The general said despite the subventions provided by the State and a few companies, the Professional League was still in need of more funds to meet up with the challenge of organizing and managing the Professional League in Cameroon.

The Secretary General of GICAM, Alain Blaise Batongue, appreciated the initiative of the Professional League saying companies’ stands to gain in terms of visibility from the partnership with the league and that if the partnership was well negotiated, there will be huge financial fall-outs for the League leading to a better organization of the Elite One and Elite Two championships. The move of the League calls to mind the request of football club presidents for an increase in State subventions.

Besides the first and second division championships, the Professional League intends to organize a super league cup, a professional football trade fair under the patronage of Confederation of African Football, CAF, comprising an Awards ceremony, exhibitions, colloquiums and workshops as well as a futsal tournament. There will also be a super cup event to close the football season pitting the winner of the Elite One championship against the winner of the league cup.

In a related development, the board meeting of the Professional League which was supposed to take place yesterday has been postponed sine die. While awaiting the date for the Cup of Cameroon final pitting New Stars against Unisport, the date for the re-opening of the new season has been purportedly billed for the first week of January. Like last year, the MTN Elite Two championship will begin first on January 5^th while the Elite One championship begins on January 6^th.