Judge Bianca Ferreira do Amaral Machado Nigri, of the 1st Regional Civil Court of Barra da Tijuca, in Rio de Janeiro, revoked this Wednesday (11) a decision handed down by the magistrate herself on Tuesday (10), which obliged the CBF (Confederação Brasileira de Futebol) to fulfill the contracts for the static advertising boards for the games of Series A and B of the Brazilian Championship with Sport Promotion.
In its dispatch, which the Sheet had access, the judge says that the company acted in “evident bad faith” by asking another demand identical to another process already in progress, citing only Series A, “while in the demand that is being processed before this Court we have a broader object , there is talk of Serie A and Serie B.”
The magistrate also cites that Sport Promotion did not mention in the case file the existence of an initial approval of a request for the maintenance of the agreements with CBF. “So that this Court only has to conclude by the bad faith of the plaintiff in inducing this Court to error.”
The company denies that it tried to deceive the Judiciary.
According to the order, as it is an urgent relief already resolved by the Court of Second Instance, the decision released on Tuesday was revoked, returning the effects of the contractual termination.
In the previous decision, the judge had determined the maintenance of the bond between the parties, “under penalty of failing to do so, incurring a fine of R$ 700 thousand for each match in which the plaintiff party [Sport Promotion] is prevented from placing their equipment”.
The entity that governs football in Brazil had filed a request for termination of the agreements, pointing out that the company owes it R$34.8 million.
Sought by the report, CBF informed through its advisory that it will not comment on the case because it is running in court.
The lawyer Gustavo Cortines, who represents Sport Promotion, denied that the company acted in bad faith, as the judge stated. “Even because, when we filed the lawsuit, one of the documents we presented was the notification made by the CBF, which expressly mentions the existence of the action in the 4th Civil Court. Never, as a lawyer, would I allow Sport Promotion to hide anything from the Judiciary,” he said. “What there is is a cognitive problem of judgment, which has failed to appreciate the abundant documentation.”
Also according to Cortines, as the CBF requested the termination of the contract alleging default, the company was forced to file a guardianship action in the 1st Civil Court of Barra da Tijuca. “If there was a default, it was on the part of the CBF because, during two years of a pandemic, it did not deliver the product it sold, which were two championships with an audience that could allow Sport Promotion to recover its investment.”
The company promises to prove its understanding in the arbitration court. “But, once the contract was terminated by the CBF, we needed to ask the Judiciary Power to protect these contracts until the arbitration court gives its final decision. And that is what we pleaded in the 1st Civil Court of Barra da Tijuca,” he explained.
The current contract between the parties was signed in 2019, when TV Globo gave up the rights to the advertising boards. With that, in a meeting held at the CBF headquarters, Sport Promotion signed individual contracts with 19 Serie A clubs —Athletico Paranaense was the exception—, valid until 2023.
By taking the case to the arbitration court, the CBF seeks to terminate all 19 contracts. The entity also wants the court to determine who has the right to trade the plates and make an agreement with the clubs.
At the beginning of this year, 11 clubs (Ceará, Atlético-MG, Coritiba, Cuiabá, Juventude, Fortaleza, Fluminense, Goiás, América-MG, Atlético-GO and Avaí) decided to terminate their contracts with Sport Promotion to close an agreement with a new company, Brax, which would have been in charge of paying the termination fines. Botafogo also broke the bond, but to display the club’s own brands.
At the time, Sport Promotion went to the common court and obtained an injunction to maintain the contracts and now awaits the decision of the arbitration court.
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