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by Sa'adi Thawfeeq

Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka (BCCSL) interim committee chairman Vijay Malalasekera threw out an open challenge to his detractors to come forward and file the charges of corruption which his committee has been allegedly accused of being involved in over the termination of the contract with WSG (World Sports Group) Nimbus and, the handing over of television rights to Taj Television.

"There is this famous theory that the Cricket Board had lost out considerable sums of money on the Taj Television contract and that the interim committee is not doing anything about it. We are also supposed to be corrupt. We are waiting for the corruption charges to be filed and we would welcome any inquiry be it from any Ministry or be it from anyone, to answer and put our case forward," said Malalasekera to an well-attended press conference held at the Cricket Board headquarters on Wednesday evening.

The Cricket Board arranged for this media briefing to explain the Memorandum of Understanding they had signed with Taj Television Ltd for international broadcasting and televising of matches played in Sri Lanka.

The interim committee left no stone unturned when they went through the whole gamut of explaining to the media in detail under what circumstances and conditions the WSG Nimbus contract was signed by the previous cricket administration and why his committee was forced to terminate the contract and sign a fresh one with Taj Television.

Malalasekera said all documents pertaining to the signing of the contract with WSG Nimbus and that with Taj Television was available for anyone from the media for inspection.

He said that the BCCSL had not accrued a loss of US$6 million by signing with Taj Television as made out in the media (not ANCL), but made a profit of nearly US$2 million instead. Documents comparing the two deals were made available to the media. "The interim committee believes in total accountability and absolute transparency," said Malalasekera.

He also stated that although WSG Nimbus has taken the interim committee of the BCCSL to court in Singapore, over the termination of the contract, they have not asked for any damages nor have they been asked to pay damages on arbitration.

"It has been misquoted in the media (not ANCL) that we have been asked to pay US$20m which is a load of rubbish," he said.

Malalasekera said that he had also written a confidential document to the International Cricket Council (ICC) hierarchy informing them of what happened to the BCCSL in their dealing with WSG Nimbus.

"As a responsible member of the ICC, it is our duty because the ICC is in contract with WSG (not WSG Nimbus)," he said. Malalasekera said that the interim committee was initially appointed to carry out the day to day administration of the BCCSL and to put a structure in place for the development of Sri Lanka cricket.

"We were not going to look backwards and see what happened in the past because that was not what we were appointed for. But unfortunately, circumstances have forced us to do so," he said. 

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