MANILA, Philippines—Solar Sports on Monday denied an exclusive Philippine Daily Inquirer report that it is about to lose the right to air Manny Pacquiao’s fights, saying the world’s pound-for-pound king is under contract with the cable network until 2011.
A top Solar Sports official also said they see no reason why Pacquiao will ditch the deal.
Ralph Roy, the vice president for business development and operations, called up the Inquirer on Monday to air Solar Sports’ side and to protest against the theme of the report.
“Pacquiao has no reasons (to leave) because we have settled all our (financial) obligations with him,” Roy said.
The Inquirer ran a report Monday on the ongoing negotiations between Pacquiao’s people and officials from a “giant television network.”
“(The story) made us appear that we are struggling,” Roy said. “It just paints a bad picture of the company, which is not the case.”
But the unimpeachable source who leaked the supposed negotiations to the Inquirer stood by his story Monday.
He said that “communications” are continuing between the giant network and Pacquiao and that an official announcement will be made very soon.
The same source actually declined to give details of the looming split, but assured the Inquirer of the validity of his story.
Asked what could make Pacquiao leave Solar Sports, Roy replied: “Only if we don’t pay him.”
Roy also said Solar Sports has the “legal prerogative where it wants to air the fights (of Pacquiao), and that (it has) a good partnership with GMA-7 going.”
Pacquiao is slated to fight British “Hitman” Ricky Hatton on May 2 in Las Vegas.
The General Santos City lefty has said he would fight just one more time after the Hatton bout so he could concentrate on a career in politics next year.
Pacquiao’s most recent fights were shown on GMA-7 through a partnership with Solar Sports. The four-time world champion in as many weight classes has a weekly show, “Pinoy Records,” and is a mainstay of one of the network’s telenovelas, “Totoy Bato.”
Solar Sports has been getting some negative publicity lately, starting with the postponement of a fight card featuring Nonito Donaire and Filipino-American Brian Villoria, which was supposed to happen later this month.
The network reportedly slashed salaries of personnel working the PBA games by 10 to 30 percent, and asked the pro league for a 25-percent discount in its royalty payments.
Solar Sports requested the discount because the PBA prohibits it from soliciting advertisements from rival products of member teams.
Source inquirer.net
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