- Premier League office to claim 10% of clubs’ gate takings
- Funds earmarked to settle referees’ allowances
- FNB Premiership set to kick off again this weekend
The Botswana Football League (BFL), pinched tight by cash woes, has once again found itself knocking on the doors of its own member clubs for financial rescue during the 2025/2026 FNB Premiership season.
The league’s secretariat has openly admitted to grappling with severe cash-flow headaches, sparking a mix of frustration and concern throughout the FNB Premiership. To patch this financial leak, the BFL’s office has decreed that all 16 Premier League teams must hand over 10 percent of their gross gate takings per match, a temporary cost-sharing magic trick designed to keep the league afloat.
This bold move was unveiled in a circular dated 13 January 2026, addressed to all club chairpersons and signed by the outgoing BFL CEO, Billy Sekgororoane. The timing is no accident: the league is poised to resume on 16 January, wrapping up a three-week break that gave the senior national team, the Zebras, a chance to strut their stuff at the 2025 AFCON in Morocco.
Sekgororoane’s letter doesn’t mince words: despite the pile-up of financial pressures, the league will roar back into action as planned. He explained that the BFL board, under the stewardship of Sipho Showa, weighed the options and decided that postponing fixtures any further would only heap more misery on clubs already struggling to pay player wages and cover day-to-day costs.
But here’s the kicker, the league itself is flat broke, particularly when it comes to paying referees and service providers on time. This financial squeeze has forced an eyebrow-raising intervention. “Effective immediately, all clubs will contribute 10 percent of their gross gate takings per match to the BFL Secretariat,” the circular commands.
The league insists these funds will be locked down tight, reserved solely for referees’ allowances, match commissioner fees, and essential matchday operations. It’s a temporary patch, they say, to be lifted as soon as the league can stand on its own two feet financially. More details on how this cash shuffle will be managed are expected to trickle down to clubs soon.
Though the league has called for “cooperation and solidarity,” the reaction among clubs is far from harmonious. Many are running on razor-thin margins, with gate receipts often their only steady cash flow. Now, they’re being asked to prop up a governing body that should, in theory, be their biggest supporter.
Adding fuel to the fire, league management recently decided to snatch funds originally earmarked for club grants to shore up the BFL’s secretariat budget. Clubs only found out after the fact, sparking sharp criticism over the lack of consultation and transparency.
This publication has previously reported that the Premier League office has been teetering on the edge of financial collapse for months. Back in August, the Botswana Football Association (BFA) stepped in with a P500,000 short-term loan to cover immediate administrative costs, a lifeline that kept the season from unraveling.
In a further show of solidarity, each Premier League team chipped in P30,000 from their P200,000 FNBB grants. This collective patchwork was an attempt to plug the gaping funding hole left by the absence of formal broadcast revenue.
The BFL argues that this tough medicine is in the game’s best interest, insisting it beats suspending the league entirely. Yet clubs remain unconvinced, wary that the burden is being unfairly shifted onto their already strained shoulders.
Voices from the trenches grumble about “milking an already overburdened cow,” with clubs effectively funding the parent body instead of receiving support from it. Even if these deductions and gate-taking levies are meant as temporary loans, many clubs feel they’re the ones gasping for cash, not the league.
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