The Argentine government has maintained that the Fútbol para Todos platform will be dissolved after rejecting the latest move by certain stakeholders in domestic football to have the program extended for a further six months.
After a meeting held yesterday (Thursday) between government officials, representatives from the Argentine Football Association and club executives, the El Cronista newspaper said the government confirmed that it will not continue to subsidise the broadcast of top-tier Primera División football and will instead stand by the terms of a termination offer outlined earlier this week.
Meetings held on Monday were said to see clubs approve a settlement offer made by the government to dissolve FPT. The government’s offer is reported to comprise 880 million pesos (€51.4m/$55.2m) in total, 530 million pesos of which is designed as compensation for the termination of the FPT contract.
Under FPT, the government paid to ensure the Primera División was shown on free-to-air television. The FPT contract was due to run until September 1, 2019, but has been cancelled by the government.
El Cronista said Boca Juniors president Daniel Angelici, along with his counterparts from Independiente and Racing, Hugo Moyano and Victor Blanco, had pushed a proposal that the government continue FPT for a further six months.
The Diario de Cuyo newspaper added that the club officials proposed that the government invest 900 million pesos to continue FPT until June, at which point the platform could be closed with no compensation due.
El Cronista added that officials also held a meeting yesterday with representatives of US media companies Fox and Turner, who are keen to secure the rights to domestic football.
Armando Pérez, who is chairing the normalisation committee designed to drive reform at the AFA, admitted that the respective parties “are getting closer on the numbers”. Until June, public-service broadcaster RTA is set to televise domestic football through TV Pública, Canal 13, Telefé and Canal 9.