Kenya’s professional golfers will begin the 2012 series on a high after Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) announced a KSH 9,000,000 sponsorship on Tuesday morning. This will mark the 6th edition of the series which was initiated back in 2007 with Kenya Commercial Bank as the main tournament sponsor. The golf series is scheduled to run for a period of 7 months with the finals set for August 2012.
The sponsorship will support the activities of the 2012 season. According to the bank’s marketing and communications director Angela Mwirigi, KCB is aimed at promoting the sport across the country in order to improve the country’s tourism sector by making Kenya a destination for golf tourism.
“Our objective is to continue to grow this championship to a level of attracting top regional and continental golfers to Kenya hence promoting the country as a golf tourism destination,” she said.
The 2012 sponsorship has increased by KSH 300,000 therefore increasing the total from last year’s 8.7 Million to KSH 9,000,000 this year.
KSH 6.4 million of the total money has been set aside for prize money that will be divided among the 6 tours scheduled for the series while 2.6 million will be used on tournament’s administration process. A bonus amount of KSH 200,000 is also inclusive in the budget. This will be awarded to the best placed professional in the KCB order of merit.
On the same note, the captain of the professional golfers of Kenya (PGK) Rizwan Charani praised the series for helping in exposing the involved golfers to different weather conditions across the country throughout the series thus hardening their skills.
“A professional golfer should have the ability to play under any kind of weather conditions and that is exactly the chance that the KCB East Africa tour has really offered our players,” stated Charani.
Mwirigi also urged other sponsors to take up individual golfers so as to promote their golf passion in to a career they can pursue.
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