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Following the submission of a damning report by the
island government’s Auditor General detailing instances of bad governance,
corruption, and financial mismanagement by Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) officials,
the cricket body finds itself in the centre of a maelstrom. Numerous cases of
excessive use and payment of SLC funding have been reported in the extensive
investigation, which focuses on the Twenty20 World Cup in Australia. The
nation’s Sports Minister abruptly terminated the SLC board on Monday based on the
report that was sent in in September; however, an appeals court overturned the
judgement by granting a 14-day stay order.
Although President Shammi Silva’s SLC committee may
legally continue to exist for the time being, the report on governance contains
harsh information. It says that an application for visas to be obtained by 56
individuals—11 members of the Executive Committee, 9 members deemed associated
with SLC, and 36 others—to visit Australia to observe the competition was
submitted to the Australian High Commission. Additionally, it mentions that as
of the report submission date, one of the individuals who was granted a visa to
watch the World Cup had already left the nation. Additionally, it notes that 23
people obtained their Australia tickets through Exclusive Procurement and
purchased them outside of the procurement process.
“Furthermore, non-matching of the information on
the dates of flights, destinations and internal flight mentioned in the
vouchers, through which payments had been made for the air tickets, with the
information mentioned in the electronic air tickets (E-Tickets) that were
submitted to the audit, were observed,” the report pointed out.
The investigation also revealed that an attempt was
made to buy five Super Soppers by paying an excess of USD 185,000 to a
“fake manufacturer.” Despite exceeding the technical standards, the
highest bidder out of the four Super Soppers in 2019 was taken into
consideration. Additionally, it stated that SLC “idly sent two
officers” to make two purchases of Super Soppers for LKR 3,502,870.
Furthermore, 155 ordinary tickets were also destroyed
while 150 tickets were purchased spending LKR 8,747,960 (of which, 76 tickets
valued at LKR 3,582,646 were unused).
A 26-point recommendation was included in the report’s
conclusion, which included inviting open bids for the purchase of airline
tickets, ensuring transparency when awarding sponsorship to media personnel,
strengthening internal control to accounting, expanding regulatory affairs by
the minister in charge of the subject or the Director General of Sports,
mechanical strengthening, and more.