Former Sri Lanka Cricket secretary Nishantha Ranatunga, who is at present embroiled in a court case against the SLC, is of the view that one should not be afraid of Interim Committees as they are not made up demons. He says that he is of the opinion that if the cause is acceptable to cricket’s governing body they would heed to such moves.
Nishantha Ranatunga is back on fire
Ranatunga explained “Right now the all powerful Indian Cricket is run by a sort of Interim Committee, which was appointed by the Supreme Court of that country. In India the sports minister is not empowered to appoint Interim Committees, but, the Sports Minister of Sri Lanka does have that power to appoint Interim Committees under exigent circumstances”.
Then explaining as to why he decided to seek legal assistance Ranatunga said “In 2016 the then Sports Minister Dayasiri Jayasekera brought an amendment to set up election committees. From that point onwards there were two EGMs held at the SLC, but, no one bothered to set up the elections committee. That was a pre-requisite. However, on the 19th the day in question suddenly they tried to push through a resolution to set up the election committee. At that point I objected and I warned them that if they proceeded the case might end in courts and that is exactly what happened. If that did not happen I would not have gone to courts. Either they did not know the law or paid scant attention to the obvious”.
Then in answer to the question why the 2015 Sidath Wettimuny led Interim Committee was not accepted by the ICC, Ranatunga said “That was a mistake committed by the then Sports Minister Navin Dissanayake. They sprang a surprise by appointing an Interim Committee much against the expectations of the members. There was a cricket AGM set in place and in addition Sri Lanka Cricket was doing well and were placed high in form in the ICC rankings – unlike today. That was why the ICC did not recognise that Interim Committee at that juncture. To add to that they even had a member of the Interim Committee – Jayananda Warnaweera who was implicated in a match fixing accusation by the ICC”
Talking of match fixing, he said “When we lost the election in 2015 I made a statement that I would not interfere with the day-to-day affairs of the running of the SLC and for over one-and-a-half years I kept mum. But, I came out for the first time when they tried to implicate Test Cricketer Chamara Silva on a match fixing case, which was mooted by a member of the SLC Committee – Ravin Wickremaratne. That was only an internal match, but even there it was match fixing.
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