Sri Lanka Cricket Is In mess! After Thilanga Sumathipala led administration left the Sri Lanka Cricket Board (SLC) On May 31st due to their inability to hold election on time, There is no board, no president to run the board. Instead, Sri Lanka’s Sports Minister Faizer Mustapha ‘mysteriously’ took SLC under his wings and since then is overseeing the board with his secretary Kamal Padmasiri.
However, It has learnt that Faizer has increasingly been involving at the every aspect of the SLC and more worryingly, has now started using the brand of Sri Lanka Cricket for his political campaign!
Cricket Age reliably learns that Faizer has forcefully taken (or abducted) all the complementary tickets for the ongoing series between host Sri Lanka and South Africa, in order to oblige his supporters to strengthen his political base.
According to sources, Faizer has taken all the tickets (worth 1.5 Million Rupees) for 10 VIP Boxes for the Fifth and Final ODI Match, to be played at R. Premadasa on Tomorrow. Also, he has given approximately 300 tickets to school kids for the tomorrow match. And, SLC will have to bear The transportation, food and all the arrangements cost for those children. In addition, for the One-Off T20 match on August 14, he has taken the same number of tickets for all the VIP Boxes.
It is noteworthy that R. Premadasa Stadium has occupied by the Most Number Of VIP Boxes Amongst all the International cricket venues in Sri Lanka.
“There are lot of VIP boxes like minister Box, President Box, Secretary Box, ExCo Box, CEO Box and vice president box. In addition there are four corporate boxes including a sponsor box. However, as there is no functioning Cricket board at SLC at the moment, it seems Sports Minister is using this opportunity for his political campaign” a former SLC administrator told Cricket Age.
This is not the first incident of this kind! On July 13, Cricket Age published a story on how Faizer took approximately 300 Tickets for the Galle Test.
Few months ago, when Faizer had replaced Dayasiri Jayasekara as Sports Minister, he said that he doesn’t know anything about Cricket. He further said that unlike earlier Sports Ministers, he wouldn’t take advantage of Sri Lanka Cricket. Now, within four months, he has taken Sri Lanka Cricket for a ride for his political campaign.
Last month also, Faizer had gone for a joyride to Dubai with his Competent Authority Kamal Padmasiri and SLC CEO Ashley De Silva, ‘officially’ for a so called meeting with the International Cricket Council (ICC) chief Shashank Manohar. That joyride costs SLC more than 3 million rupees with no outcome whatsoever!
“Go and meet to ICC chief was just a waste of SLC money. Sports Minister could have made a correspondence with ICC through a mail” the former SLC administrator added further.
