Letter to the Sports Editor…The cricket administration act prohibits any GCB president from being a WICB director

May 13, 2017 Sports

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Dear Sports Editor,
We recently viewed a most derogatory and disrespectful letter penned by Mr. Claude Raphael and published by the KN and Guyana Chronicle on May 10th 2017 in the sports pages of those dailies, headlined ‘Drubahadur must publicly account for his GCB Stewardship”. The Board has also noticed other letters popping up ever so often in the media spreading blatant lies and hate propaganda against our officials. The Board views this situation as very troubling, especially when the media displays such poor journalistic skills in publishing these very caustic letters verbatim without any attempt to authenticate the veracity of its contents.
The Board had issued an advisory last month regarding the resignation of its President, Mr. Drubahadur and had duly provided the reason for Mr. Drubahadur’s resignation in that release. Mr. Drubahadur had also provided his public comments to the media on this issue and has since moved on. The Board wishes to state quite categorically that it is very proud of the tenure of Mr. Drubahadur and the great strides that were made in our development during this period. If Mr. Raphael is so much interested in learning about the stewardship of Mr. Drubahadur and the GCB, perhaps he can stop by the GCB’s Office anytime to uplift the most recent copy of The Guyana Cricketer magazine which outlines the achievements and successes of the Board and its various representative teams. Previous copies of The Guyana Cricketer magazine are also available online for his perusal.
As a former executive of the GCB, it is rather disappointing that Mr. Raphael continues to spew such hate, bile, disrespect and rancor against its officials in public without any justification whatsoever. The Board is of the firm opinion that Mr. Raphael is certainly entitled to his own opinion and is free to have his own views on different circumstances, but surely he is not entitled to his own facts. The facts are the facts and these cannot change to suit the whims and fancies of anyone.
It is public knowledge that Mr. Raphael and his team desperately pleaded with the Judge on the Saturday prior to the AGM to stop the holding of the GCB’s AGM in July 2011 which was statutorily due since January 2011. The reason for this delay was the intervention/investigation by the Ministry of Labour, Mansoor Nadir, into the operations of the GCB under the Friendly Societies Act. The Rupert Foster report is there to prove the witch-hunting that took place for 6 months in 2011. The court eventually removed the GCB from the control of this Act since the rules of the Friendly Societies Act dictate that all entities should have a minimum of 7 members and GCB only had 3 members.
This AGM went ahead as planned on the Sunday following clearance from that court hearing by the Honourable James Bovell Drakes. It is again public knowledge that this AGM was video recorded, for obvious reasons,where all 3 members of the GCB were present. The President, Mr. Chetram Singh, ruled that the Demerara Cricket Board should not participate in the meeting since there was a cloud of uncertainty over its status. The Essequibo Cricket Board was present with its full complement of 9 delegates and the Berbice Cricket Board was present with 5 delegates inclusive of its President, Vice President and Secretary which formed the quorum of 14 delegates at that meeting. The BCB even moved motions at this AGM. It really boggles the mind that Mr. Raphael, a supposedly respected person, would continue to spread such blatant falsehoods in the public domain with his constant reference to this AGM being illegal.
The GCB would, once again, wish to recognize that the Cricket Administration Act of 2014(CAA) is the law of the land and continues to operate within its confines even though we hold the view that the Act is deeply flawed so much so that we have challenged same in our legal system. The WICB had adopted some of the recommendations contained in the “Wilkins report” that it had commissioned, which called for the distinct separation of the Directors and the Shareholders of the Board. The CAA, obviously, did not recognize that change in the governance structure of the WICB and thus only dealt with the historical structure of that Board in the revised constitution foisted upon the administrators in Guyana.The Select Parliamentary Committee and a special PPP Government Panel headed by Mr. Jagdeo/Mr. Anil Nandalall, that met with the stakeholders prior to the drafting of the Cricket Bill, totally disregarded the submissions of the GCB and the DCB, but chose to follow verbatim the dictates of Mr. Raphael and his misguided team, hence, the lopsided and contradictory clauses contained in the CAA. The current constitution of the GCB enshrined in the CAA clearly states that GCB shall be represented by the President and one other (namely the Chairman of the Senior Selection Panel or the Chairman of the Cricket Development Committee) at General Meetings of the WICB. For those who are not familiar with the GCB, Mr. Raphael held both positions when he was an Executive, quite conveniently.
The CAA makes no provision for the Directors of the WICB but it is clear that the GCB President cannot serve as a Director since the Cricket Administration Act stipulate that this individual must be a shareholder representative. Mr. Drubahadur had always represented the GCB at the AGMs of the WICB until his resignation. Perhaps, Mr. Raphael with his supposedly vast legal knowledge would care to comment on whether any amendments can be made to the GCB’s constitution contained within the said Act.
The GCB continues to ensure that the next generation of cricketers is prepared to continue in a successful pathway. We are also well aware that a lot of armchair administrators are envious of our success.
The Guyana Cricket Board.

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