Lankan cricket on chopping block or at crossroads?
There is a certain saying to this effect. “To the blind man even the most precious stone would go unnoticed even if he happens to kick that stone on the street”. To me cricket in this country has just the opposite effect, but still like in the case of the blind man, no justice is being done to the precious stone on the street. Here, instead of just picking it up, too many people are kicking it around chanting “Oh! What a precious stone this is”, and, day by day the value of the gem is being mucked up.
Cricket has become almost a lifestyle of the Lankans, 150 years after the ruling white sahibs sowed its first seeds. Now in this game of cricket, very little English remains. We play the game in typical Sri Lankan style — a style that is inimitable. Our approach is unique and hence in this three plus decades of top rung International cricket we have gained recognition as one of the front runners. But, are we doing justice to those accolades that we have received in this short span? Or is it that it has become the crown jewel that every Perera, Silva and Fernando on the street wants to flaunt on his head.
Now we have entered into the second season of the latest cricket governance drama serial — it is not called the ‘Game of Thrones’ but, the ‘Castle at Maitland Place’. During the first episode a prince from the faraway land came and conquered the castle with the help of the nasty soothsayer and put the castle in charge of another high priest. Yet, that did not go well with the land of the high and mighty. They cut off the supplies to the city, but, kept feeding the soldiers.
Now the old guard has regrouped and is ready for the battle.
A few days ago, Sports Minister Naveen Dissanayake met the stakeholders in a bid to untangle the problem over his decision to call off the AGM and then form the IC. It is learned that even the ICC had indicated to him that Sri Lankan authorities would have to settle their problems with the stakeholders. So, the minister promised the same and wanted time till the end of this year. Though there were certain disagreements, the meeting ended up almost hunky dory.
Then the few stakeholders who attended the meeting went back to the rest of the Sri Lanka Cricket membership, consisting more than two thirds of the stakeholders. Conspicuous by their absence are a few Jayantha Dharmadasa camp members who support the Dissanayake-appointed Interim Committee. The outcome of the meeting was the stakeholders at the meeting unanimously demanding that they should push for elections at least by August 31 rather than waiting till the end of the year; if not they should contemplate legal action.
The Sunday Musings met up with the SLC’s outgoing Senior Vice President Mohan de Silva who attended both these meetings. We asked him: Now that the Sri Lanka cricket is in a tight corner with cash shortages, the Interim Committee contemplating so many structural changes and the membership calling for tough action, how were they going to row their boat without hurting the game in the country?
The former VP explained how things developed to this crisis situation. “Initially when we met the minister we did indicate to him that the way he revoked his decision and postponed the AGM and installed the Interim Committee was not justifiable.’
He said even the three reasons pointed out by the Minister for his action like the four-year rule, the Handunnetti petition and the Nugawela petition were not sufficient reasons to postpone an AGM and form an Interim Committee.
“Now we have come to a situation where the ICC stipulated regulations of 2012 are being enacted. The ICC has declined to recognise the Interim Committee and has decided to withhold funds, which is a very disturbing thing. Then with regard to borrowings, here again we are in a situation where we were just trying to come out of the woods. During the last twoyears we generated a lot of funds and we were hopeful of clearing all out debts by the end of this year.”
Then we asked: “That is what you contend. But do you really have proof that you were almost out of the woods?”
De Silva said: “Yes, our accounts clearly showed that. That is why we released funds to all our stakeholders – a thing that happened after quite some time. We released almost 240 million rupees to our stakeholders on certain criteria”.
Once again de Silva explained that the membership in one voice expressed their view and said that they would not wait till next January and wanted us to request for elections by August 31. They felt that their right to elect their own office bearers has been hijacked.
Then came the bombshell. He said: “We have been informed by the ICC CEO David Richardson that he is compiling a report that is to be submitted at the ICC Board meeting in the West Indies. The meeting is scheduled to held end June, but two or three weeks prior to that, the governance review committee is scheduled to meet. There they would compile a report on the Lankan situation and present it to the ICC board meeting for further action. Here if Sri Lanka gets a negative report, we would be in deeper trouble”.
He said if the ICC takes drastic action, Sri Lanka would be affected financially. He pointed out that during this time there are some International tours down in the card. He said: “Now see the other day we saw a huge advertisement calling for sponsors for the Indian tour with an extended date. This shows that people are not coming forward to sponsor events. It shows that there is uncertainty in the institution and people are reluctant to come forward. Those will have a spiralling effect on the administration. Our stance is – we may be not eligible according to the four year rule, there will be others”.
De Silva explained that even the monies that the SLC already borrowed could have been saved, if not for the action the ministry has taken. “Now Rs. 650 million has been borrowed at a staggering Rs. 7 million interest a month. This money should not have been borrowed at all. The minister requested us to help him out and we reciprocated, but, the membership vehemently opposed in one voice saying they cannot wait. Now we are hoping to meet the minister again on Tuesday with the intention of reaching an amicable settlement”.
When asked how they would be hoping that this type of situation would not recur, he replied: “As you know Sri Lanka Cricket is an independent organisation. Our stakeholders are the co-real owners of Sri Lanka cricket. We are not dependent upon the government. Even that petition filed by Hadunnettige, the commissioner has stated that they had no jurisdiction to inquire into these things. We have our own constitution, we abide by that, but unfortunately the Sports Law supersedes our constitution when it comes to social issues. So the Sports Ministers — when they come to office they must discharge their duties according to the stipulations framed in the Sports Law. If there are allegations of malpractice, abuse of funds, mismanagement and failure to carry our orders, the Sports Minister in terms of the Sports Law can cancel the registration of a sports body. Actually, Interim Committees are necessary evils, if the Sports Minister does not have those powers, sports bodies will go to town. The Minister must have some powers with those regulations, but he must not abuse those powers vested in him. We made it very clear to the minister that we did not agree with his actions.”
The former VP added that even with these actions they do not want to disrupt or harm the game in any manner. But, he said that they were disappointed about Interim Committee chairman Sidath Wettimuny’s claim that the game is nose diving, whereas the game has been doing very well within the past ten years and the records just go on to prove that.
Then he added that they were aware of the declining standards of junior cricket and the growing gap between the existing club cricket system and International cricket. He said they even had taken steps to overcome those issues.
Finally Mohan de Silva said: “When we met the Sports Minister he asked us to leave the ICC to him claiming that he would handle that institution. So meanwhile if something happens, we would hold him responsible for that eventuality”.