ICC suspends Sri Lanka Cricket’s membership after Parliament decision
COLOMBO – Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) has been suspended by the International Cricket Council (ICC) with immediate effect because of extensive government interference in the board’s administration.
“The ICC Board met today and determined that Sri Lanka Cricket is in serious breach of its obligations as a Member, in particular, the requirement to manage its affairs autonomously and ensure that there is no government interference in the governance, regulation and/or administration of cricket in Sri Lanka,” the ICC said in a statement, adding, “The conditions of the suspension will be decided by the ICC Board in due course.”
While the ICC’s quarterly meetings are scheduled for November 18-21 in Ahmedabad, the ICC Board met online on Friday (10) to address the SLC situation. It is learned the ICC Board was concerned by the government’s interference in the SLC, from governance to finance and even matters concerning the national team. It is understood the next course of action will be decided when the ICC Board meets on November 21.
The ICC’s decision might appear to have come out of the blue, but SLC may not have been surprised. It is understood that SLC asked the ICC Board to take this extreme step. The ICC also continues to recognize SLC president Shammi Silva, who is currently in India and attended Friday’s meeting, as the elected representative. He is also likely to be present at the ICC meetings in Ahmedabad as the ICC Board has allowed SLC representatives to be present in an observer capacity.
Though the ICC has termed the sanction a “suspension”, in reality it is more of a warning as the ICC seeks to prevent further government interference in the running of SLC. As it stands, the suspension will not have any immediate serious impact on Sri Lankan cricket. Sri Lanka’s World Cup campaign ended on Thursday (9) and there is no cricket happening in the country until December. No ICC funds are due to go to SLC until January.
On Monday (6), Sri Lanka’s sports minister Roshan Ranasinghe had sacked the SLC board and installed an interim committee headed by Arjuna Ranatunga, but Sri Lanka’s courts essentially reinstated the board a day later by issuing a 14-day stay order on the gazette that dissolved the board.
Since then, the affairs of Sri Lanka Cricket have been debated at length in the country’s Parliament. But as of Friday, when the ICC suspension came, it was the elected SLC board headed by Silva that was running cricket in the country.
Even if the interim committee was in power, the appointment of such committees by the government had not prompted suspension by the ICC before. The previous occasion when an interim committee was in place, from 2014 to 2015, resulted in the ICC putting the funds due to SLC in escrow, and demoted SLC to observer status at board meetings. But they remained a member of the ICC officially.
Sri Lanka’s sports minister has also had the role of ratifying all Sri Lankan national teams, as per the nation’s sports law, which has been in place since 1973.
SLC is the second Full Member to be suspended by ICC in the last four years after Zimbabwe Cricket was suspended in 2019 for government interference. However, unlike in Zimbabwe’s case, where all cricket activities in the country were abruptly shut down, in addition to a freeze on funding, the ICC will tread carefully in Sri Lanka’s case.
Earlier this week, President Ranil Wickremesinghe appointed a four-member cabinet sub-committee to look into the Interim Committee for Sri Lanka Cricket appointed by Ranasinghe and its future activities. However, before the committee came up with its report, the Parliament approved the sacking of top cricket administrators.
Power Minister Kanchana Wijesekara, a member of the four-member cabinet sub-committee on Thursday told the Parliament that if the ICC decides to impose a ban on SLC by any chance as a result of the resolutions tabled in Parliament, the 225 members of the Parliament should take over the responsibility for it.
Some decisions by Sports Minister Ranasinghe also have led both World Rugby and FIFA to sack Sri Lanka from their memberships.
-ESPN/ENCL
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