NAIROBI, September – Kenyan Premier League champions, Gor Mahia, have mutually terminated their contract with Nakuru based Good Bread and entered into a new partnership with the famed Elliot.
Club chairman, Ambrose Rachier who declined to reveal why the current deal collapsed, told Capital Sport on Tuesday they have signed a one year contract with Elliot Bread who will manufacture K’Ogalo branded loaves.
The new deal will earn the record domestic champions twice the amount they were making with Elliot forking Sh2 for every branded loaf sold as compared to Sh1 they were receiving.
“We have a new one from today (Tuesday) since we terminated the one we had before. I can’t disclose the reasons of our departure but in our contract, there was a clause that allowed either party to mutually end the deal.
“We have written to Good Bread notifying them of our exit and since I don’t want to breach the contract, I can’t explain further. The deal is almost identical but we want to give Elliot a chance to see if we will perform better financially,” Rachier, who also serves as SportPesa Premier League chairman, told.
The Good Bread deal that was signed in April and launched by former Prime Minister and patron, Raila Odinga, was already baking the cash, raking in Sh130,000 (USD1,251.57) daily before it went sour.
In a tale reminiscent of Jesus’ parable of feeding the hungry by multiplying five loaves of bread and five fish, the club was to rake close to Sh4.8m (USD 46,211.90) monthly and a staggering by local standards, Sh57m (USD548,766.36) per annum if shoppers could continue digging in to Gor Bread.
The most decorated club in the country require at least Sh70m (USD 673,923.60) per annum to effectively compete in the domestic top flight, continental and regional tournament whilst fulfilling their obligations to playing staff.
Unbeaten K’Ogalo has been malnourished financially for two seasons and in July, the begging bowl for alms was out to enable them honour the Cecafa Kagame Cup where they finished runners-up after losing 2-0 to locals Azam FC.
“We are doing badly in-terms of finances. We are really struggling looking for money to sustain the club. It has been a difficult season for us since we have had fewer home matches where we largely depend on the gate collection to get things running.
“But despite all that, I want to congratulate the players and technical bench for the good performance they have registered so far. We are taking each game at a time because we have not won the league yet, but even if we are declared champions before the end of the season, we will still take our matches seriously,” the Gor, boss underscored.
Sitting comfortably at the summit of the log on 62 points, K’Ogalo just need six points to retain the title for the third time in a row and emulate the class of 1985 who were the first three peat winners.