Rwanda scores big as £80m Arsenal deal ends

Arsenal and the Rwanda Development Board (RDB) will officially end their £10m-a-year ‘Visit Rwanda’ sleeve sponsorship at the close of the 2025/26 season, bringing an eight-year, high-profile partnership to an end.

The deal is worth over £80 million across an eight-year duration, beginning in 2018, and immediately became one of the Premier League’s most talked-about sponsorships.

The £10m-a-year agreement made Rwanda Arsenal’s first-ever official sleeve partner. It was later extended to run until June 2026.

The partnership has supported Rwanda’s ambition to become an international sporting hub in Africa and hosts more global sporting events while delivering grassroots football initiatives that have helped hundreds of young players and coaches develop their skills and inspire greater participation in sport across the country.

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Jean-Guy Afrika, chief executive officer, Rwanda Development Board, in a statement on Arsenal’s official website, said: “We are proud of what this partnership has achieved over many years of collaboration. It broke new ground for tourism boards around the world, driving awareness and visitation for Rwandan tourism at a pace traditional campaigns could never match.

“And whilst we are now focused on expanding that momentum into new sports and new markets, we remain grateful to Arsenal for its support, partnership, and shared belief in Rwanda’s story over the past eight years.

“We look forward to continuing our relationship with the wider Kroenke Sports and Entertainment Group through our recent partnerships with the LA Rams and So-Fi Stadium in Los Angeles, and we remain a fully committed and engaged partner of Arsenal’s men’s and women’s teams for the remainder of the season.

We wish them all the very best in their continuing quest for even more sporting success in the months ahead.”

How much Rwanda gained

According to the Rwanda Development Board’s 2024 Annual Report, the country recorded about 1.3 million tourists in 2024, and the government of Rwanda generated $650 million in tourism revenue, a 47 percent increase since the partnership began in 2018.

RDB credits Arsenal’s global reach for helping accelerate Rwanda’s tourism visibility and drawing new visitors, especially from Europe and the United States.

Arsenal players and legends, including Alex Scott, Bacary Sagna and Mathieu Flamini, also visited Rwanda as part of promotional tours, content shoots, school events and conservation drives, creating global media exposure worth tens of millions of pounds.

According to Arsenal’s statement, the partnership helped the Gunners fund a sustainable path to competing for major trophies and deepened engagement with millions of African supporters. The club supported grassroots football projects that trained hundreds of young players and coaches.

Richard Garlick, chief executive officer, Arsenal, added: “Our first-ever sleeve partnership with Visit Rwanda has been a significant journey. Over many years, we’ve worked together to raise global awareness of Rwanda’s tourism and conservation efforts and built many new connections with our supporters across Africa.”

Other Benefits

One year after the deal began, the Rwanda Development Board (RDB) said its sleeve sponsorship of English soccer club Arsenal to promote the Visit Rwanda brand has resulted in benefits valued at £36 million ($44 million) in just one year.

Belise Kariza, the RDB chief tourism officer, said, “Before the signing of the partnership, 71% of the millions of Arsenal fans globally did not think of Rwanda as a tourist destination. At the end of the first year of the partnership, half of Arsenal fans would consider Rwanda as a destination to visit.

“In terms of overall value, the partnership so far, in year one, is worth £36 million or over Rwf36 billion. This number is based on TV viewership and social media.”

“We can definitely say it has paid off.”

Kariza went on to add that the agreement factored into the 1.7 million tourists that visited Rwanda in 2018, thanks to the brand exposure Arsenal gave to Visit Rwanda. She also said that the content created to promote the country as a holiday destination, aided by a tie-up with National Geographic, had seen at least 4.3 million interactions over social media and other activities.

Furthermore, Visit Rwanda’s YouTube channel saw a 100 percent increase in subscribers, while the brand’s Twitter and Instagram followings enjoyed a boost of 72% and 577%, respectively, off the back of the deal.

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Number of tourism visits to Rwanda from 2018 to 2024

During the period the sponsorship deal lasted, Rwanda continued to record an increasing number of tourist visits. Rwanda saw approximately 1.51 million tourists in 2018 and 1.54 million in 2019, with numbers declining to around 1.4 million in 2023 and 1.36 million in 2024, though 2024’s total is still considered below pre-pandemic levels.

There are no recent 2025 numbers available, but the country is targeting increased tourism for that year. In 2018, the number rose to 1.51 million visitors, and in 2019, it rose again to 1.54 million visitors.

Data are not available for 2020, but the number likely declined significantly due to the pandemic. Data are not available for 2021 and 2022, but in 2023, recovery from Covid-19 was seen with a record of 1.4 million international visitors. The numbers again rose to 1.36 million tourists in 2024, reaching almost pre-COVID levels.

Why Nigeria may not attract similar deals

Olumide Ohunayo, industry analyst and director of research at Zenith Travels, told BusinessDay that £80m Rwanda deal worked well because Rwanda had something to sell.

“What are we selling with the daily reports of massacre and insecurity? Beyond Detty December, there are lot of things to be done. You can’t isolate aviation and tourism from the Nigerian economy and Nigerian security. This does not encourage tourism. We should first get the basic things in place,” Ohunayo said.

“We need to get these structures in place before we begin to advertise Nigeria on any football team shirt. You cannot get commensurate tourism attractions because of the situation of the country. We are yet to work on visas, and transit airports,” he explained.

Seyi Adewale, chief executive officer of Mainstream Cargo Limited, told BusinessDay that even if Nigeria manages to attract a deal like this, it would have little impact.

“How this translates to good impact is debatable. On a hilarious note, what premiership club will Nigeria choose as that we have a huge Man U and Chelsea fan base? Will it be subjected to a national poll?

“More seriously, Rwanda is a very small country in comparison to Nigeria. Nigerians in the diaspora are strong and large enough to directly market their own country. You may note that we have 2nd and 3rd generation Nigerians that are large and fully embedded and entrenched in many of the developed nations,” Adewale said.