NOC comes clean

Allegations made by Arjuna Ranatunga, MP and Dimuthu Abeykoon, MP against the National Olympic Committee

During the committee stage of the Budget Debate 2008, at the time of Votes of the Ministries of Tourism and Sports were discussed, Arjuna Ranatunga, MP and Dimuthu Abeykoon, MP made certain allegations against the National Olympic Committee which are completely unfounded.

Our senior Vice President, Deva Henry has, in the attached statement, replied these allegations fairly and squarely and I shall be grateful if you will kindly publish this in your esteemed journal giving the same prominence as the statement of the MPs, as we would be failing in our duty to our membership if this matter was ignored.

Hemasiri Fernando, President, NOC.

On the 19th November during the Budget debate on the votes of the Ministries of Tourism and Sports, Arjuna Ranatunga, MP of the UPFA and Dimuthu Abeykoon, MP of the JVP made the following allegations against the National Olympic Committee:

1. That a sum of one million dollars received from the International Olympic Committee has been misappropriated.

2. That money received from the Treasury for the 10th South Asian games have been improperly utilised.

3. That in order to extend the term of office of the office bearers in the National Olympic Committee the former Minister of Sports was misdirected to amend the Sports Law.

It is interesting to note that these two MPs brought forward those very same allegation during Budget Debate 2007 too. Besides Ranatunga has brought up these allegations at the Public Accounts Committee and Consultative Committee meetings.

These baseless allegations which are made under the cover of parliamentary privileges have received wide publicity in the written press and has been the subject of discussions among television viewers. Therefore as a senior Vice President of the National Olympic Committee, I feel it is my incumbent duty to put the records straight and thereby protect the good name of the National Olympic Committee which has been sullied by these unwarranted allegations.

The NOC which was inaugurated in 1937 now constitutes 60 members representing 22 National Associations. The Executive Committee consists of 22 members. All policy, administrative and financial decisions are approved by the Executive Committee.

All decisions taken by the Executive Committee are placed before the General Assembly for covering approval and it should be noted that up to now every single decision taken by the Executive Committee has been approved by the General Assembly. An important fact which should not be overlooked is that any ad-hoc decision taken by the President and the Secretary General has to be ratified by the General Assembly.

The foremost allegation made by the aforesaid Members of Parliament concerns the alleged misappropriation of a sum of one million US Dollars received as aid for tsunami victims.

Never in its 70 year history did the NOC receive such a large sum of money. Although a million dollars may be a small sum for the Cricket Board, it is indeed a very large sum for the NOC.

We would like to give below for the information of all concerned a list of monetary assistance received by the NOC as tsunami assistance.

These sums have been credited to our accounts No. 1030006064 at the Commercial Bank and No. 01100102701 at the Standard Chartered Bank and these are reflected in the financial statements for the relevant years.

The final accounts of the NOC are subject to audit by the Auditor General and a firm of Chartered Accountants, approved by the Auditor General, have audited and certified the final accounts. Copies of the audited statements of accounts for the year 2006 and 2007 have been forwarded to the Ministry of Sports and Public Recreation.

member country

Whenever any financial assistance is granted to a member country by any international or continental association, such assistance is given under strict conditions.

The assistance received by us for the tsunami victims too were subject to such strict conditions. The receipt of these monies and their disbursements has been specifically recorded in the relevant final statements which have not only been audited by the Auditor General, but also, in fact, by an IOC representative who visited Sri Lanka in September 2006. A report of satisfaction from James McLeod, the IOC representative, has been received by the NOC.

legal provisions

In accordance with general legal provisions and the provisions of the Sports Law, the Auditor General and the Secretary to the Ministry of Sports are empowered to scrutinise the final accounts of the NOC. For this reason we have submitted our audited final accounts to both these institutions. They have, in turn, accepted our final accounts without question and at no time have they raised any query pertaining to the points raised by the two Members of Parliament.

When the present Committee took office in 1997, the bank balance of the NOC was nearly Rs. 60,000.

A proper office with minimum office furniture or at least a bicycle to be used in delivering of letters was not available at the Olympic Committee. But nearly 10 years later, we have constructed a four-storey building costing Rs. 160 million and other assets. We would never have been able to achieve this strong financial position if strict control and management of finances was absent.

administration

The membership of the NOC is completely satisfied with the management of its administration and finances, and it is clear that these baseless allegations made by these two MPs are aimed at vilifying the NOC.

At a time when we have exhausted all resources that we had amassed for our building project, if these two Members of Parliament assert that an international organisation has given us a large grant, which we of course have not received, the entire membership of the NOC would be grateful if these sources are revealed to us so that these grants could then be recovered.

What is necessary to be done, instead of making wild allegations is to provide us the following information.

(a) the name of the institution remitting money

(b) date

(c) who received the money and the bank account to which it was credited.

As soon as such information is received we shall discuss this matter with the relevant authorities and take steps to recover these funds. We could thereafter submit a final report to submit to the MPs for their information.

false statement

Other point raised by the two MPs is the allegation that we have by subterfuge extended the terms of office of our office bearers by misguiding the former Minister of Sports to amend the Sports Law and the constitution of the NOC. This too is a completely false statement aimed at misguiding the public.

Sections 18 to 21 of the Sports Law 1973 are relevant to the NOC. In 1993, the Minister of Sports amended certain sections which resulted in a divergence between the Sports Law and the provisions of the Olympic Charter of the IOC.

The main provision which differed for each other concerned the terms of office of office bearers which was limited to 2 terms of 4 years each. It was the opinion of the IOC that the term of office of a member of the NOC should not be limited to two terms.

Not only as the IOC not prepared to recognise our Constitution they also found that our participation in future Olympic Games too would be in jeopardy.

Therefore, after discussing the letter sent by the Secretary of the Olympic Council of Asia on behalf of the IOC, the then Secretary of the Ministry of Sports decided to amend the relevant sections of the Sports Law, thereby removing the maximum period of membership in the NOC.

Accordingly the relevant sections of the Sports Law were approved by Parliament and the Constitution of the NOC incorporating these amendments was approved by the Minister of Sports on 28th October 2005.

NOC members

In this process of amending these provisions, at no stage had any mention been made of an extension of the terms of office of NOC members.

The term of office of a member of the NOC is 4 years and there has to be an election to select office bearers once in 4 years. There has been no deviation from this process and in accordance with Section 10.2 of the Constitution of the NOC the election of office bearers is held in the year following the year of the Olympic Games. Therefore the next election of office bearers will be held before August 2009.

The intention of these Members of Parliament by their utterances is to inform the general public that the present office bearers in order to remain in office indefinitely, misguided the Minister of Sports to amend the Sports Law and the Constitution of the NOC.

majority vote

There are 225 Members of Parliament. It is impossible to get a Law passed through subterfuge. There is a procedure to be followed and any amendment or approval is granted through a majority vote.

Arjuna Ranatunga and Dimuthu Abeykoon were both Members of Parliament in 2005 when the amendment was passed and their complaint that the amendment was done through subterfuge is indeed surprising.

A point that should be emphatically stated is that nowhere has there been a mention of extending the term of office of office bearers. According to the provisions in the Constitution of the NOC elections for the appointment of office bearers will be held once in four years during the year immediately after the year of the Olympic Games. We have no intention of amending these provisions even in the future. If the two Members of Parliament had studied the Sports Law and the relevant amendments this occasion to waste our time replying would not have arisen.

misappropriated

The third point raised by the two MPs was that funds allocated for the 10th SAF Games have been misappropriated. This 10th SAF Games were organised and held by a special Organising Committee appointed by the Government. The co-chairmen of this Committee were the Minister of Sports and the President of the NOC. Besides these officials, the Secretary of the Ministry of Sports, its Additional Secretary, Director General of Sports, Members of the NOC and a number of other high officials served in the Committee.

A special committee under the chairmanship of the Secretary to the Ministry of Sports was appointed to decide on the financial aspects, procurement of goods and services etc. The other members of the Committee were President of the NOC, Additional Secretary of the Ministry, Chief Accountant and a representative of the Treasury.

A sum of Rs. 900 million was allocated for these Games and the Treasury made available the required finances over a period of 2 years.

important aspect

The important aspect which should be emphasised here is that at the end of the Games a sum of Rs. 100 million remained unspent. Moreover, a balance of Rs. 18 million which had remained in the bank was transferred to the National Sports Fund.

By mid-2007 all income and expenditure statements of the 10th SAF Games had been prepared and audited by the Auditor General. The approval final accounts were printed and sent to all relevant officials.

At the ceremony held in this connection the former Minister of Sports and Youth Affairs invited all media personnel and others to obtain copies for their scrutiny. I understand that some did obtain copies.

In 2004, Pakistan spent a sum of Rupees five billion to stage the 9th SAF Games in Islamabad. For a festival which easily surpassed the 2004 Islamabad Games, Sri Lanka spent less than one billion rupees. The Organising Committee was able to complete the Games using Rs. 100 million less than the estimated figure.

It is unfair to point a finger at the NOC in this regard as the Games was not entirely organised and run by the NOC. While, according to the Constitution of the South Asia Olympic Council, the responsibility of organising the Games rests with the Government of Sri Lanka.

It was, however, successfully staged by the collaboration of the Ministry of Sports, Department of Sports Development, National Olympic Committee, relevant National Sports Associations, Government Departments and a host of other institutions.

It is indeed a pity that such a supreme effort had been vilified by two Members of Parliament.

If a complete report on the 10th SAF Games is needed it could be obtained from the former Secretary to the Ministry of Sports who did an excellent job as the Chief Accounting Officer of the Ministry and the Chairman of the Finance Committee.

The NOC is not the property of one or two individuals. It is a Non Governmental Organisation affiliated to the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA), Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

proud history

While it has a proud history of 70 years it is considered as one of the best NOCs in Asia.

The National Olympic Committee quite emphatically deny these baseless and false allegations made by these two Members of Parliament under the cover of their parliamentary privileges.

We would state that our membership is ever ready to meet any challenge in order to protect the good name of the NOC.

Finally, we wish to stress one more point. If these two Members of Parliament who have been bold enough to level these unfair and false allegations under the cover of Parliamentary Privilege, would wish to state them openly in public we would offer them a golden opportunity to prove these points in the Supreme Court.

Deva Henry, Vice President, National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka