SCTV inks exclusive rights for World Cup

Zakki Hakim, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Surya Citra Televisi (SCTV) has become the exclusive and official TV broadcast partner in Indonesia for the FIFA World Cup 2006, according to a release here on Wednesday.

The partnership, which gave SCTV exclusive rights to air the matches live, was confirmed following the signing of the contract between SCTV and Infront Sports & Media WM GMBH, a German-based worldwide World Cup distributor here on Wednesday.

The month-long 2006 World Cup will run from June 9 to July 9 in Germany with 32 nations represented.

With SCTV being the sole broadcaster here, not all 64 matches can be shown live as several are played at the same time.

"All 64 matches in the 2006 World Cup will be broadcast, either live or tape-delayed, if there is a time conflict with one or more matches," said SCTV President Director Wisnu Hadi said in a press release here on Wednesday.

The 2006 World Cup matches will be staged in a number of cities with Munich hosting the opening match and Berlin playing host to the final match.

SCTV's competitor, Rajawali Citra Televisi (RCTI) had the exclusive broadcast rights of the 2002 World Cup held in Korea and Japan.

Most soccer fanatics here would, however, prefer that more than one TV station gets the broadcast rights so all the matches can be shown live.

Several local fans lamented the fact that TV producers would be deciding which match they would get to see live.

"If TV stations shared the rights to broadcast the matches live, then I would not need to wait for the tape-delayed version and I would get the choice of which game to watch," said Putro, a local soccer fan.

During the 2002 World Cup, RCTI ordered cafes, restaurants and sports bars to request permission from station to show the games, arguing that it had to protect its sponsors.