David Becker, a South African attorney and former Head of Legal for the International Cricket Council (ICC), was brought in by the Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) Transformation Committee to draft a new constitution and legal framework aimed at reforming the board’s governance. However, it has Immediately sparked an Islandwise controversy, as Becker once blocked Sri Lanka from gaining due credit from the ICC for innovation of Player – Referral (DRS).
Becker’s involvement in the drafting process has met with severe public and legal criticism in Sri Lanka. Detractors and legal advocates have strongly objected to his appointment, citing his controversial past role at the ICC where he drafted legal opinions that denied intellectual property credit to Sri Lankan lawyer Senaka Weeraratna regarding the invention of the Umpire Decision Review System (DRS) framework.
Critics have specifically argued that the SLC repeated past institutional oversights by hiring Becker without conducting a rigorous vetting process, leading to ongoing pushback against the proposed constitutional drafts.
Senaka Weeraratna established that he conceptualized and published the “Player Referral” system as early as March 25, 1997, in an article for The Australian. This occurred nine years before the ICC introduced its version in 2006.
However, ICC claimed that it was Spearheaded by its legal department under David Becker. The ICC maintained that its cricket committees conceived the technology and application independently, claiming total ignorance of Weeraratna’s earlier global publications.
Thus, it’s a shame that Instead of backing Senaka Weeraratna, who changed international Cricket ( and several other sports) with the revolutionary DRS concept and brought world wide recognition to Sri Lanka, the CTC chose to pay the very lawyer who authored the legal briefs against their own countryman.
Another culprit of this greatest betrayal with Sri Lanka Cricket was Jonathan Hall, Counsel for ICC, who gave flawed legal advice on authorship DRS claiming that it was the work of an unnamed and undisclosed employee of ICC or a contractor but not the work of Senaka Weeraratna.
Another shocking thing is that The ICC has urged Sri Lanka Cricket to conduct elections at the earliest opportunity (maximum before August 1), while officially writing a letter. The CTC, however, has not made it publically as yet, which casts doubts on their intention!
Cricket Age understands that the majority of stakeholders at Maitland Place have refused any constitutional reforms through parliament, as it directly violates SLC constitution.
