Resolving CAN dispute: Three options emerge

Onlinekhabar Tuesday, May 17, 2016

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Kathmandu, May 17

Two weeks after Nepal’s cricket association was suspended by the world governing body citing dispute in the sport, stakeholders have broken ice to seek ways to get the sport back on track.

According to sources, members of the ad-hoc executive committee formed by the government (National Sports Council) and its rival have held informal talks to come up with possible ways to resolve the deadlock. As a result of the negotiations, three options have emerged to settle the dispute in Cricket Association of Nepal.

CAN, which is nearing its 70th anniversary, has always been surrounded in controversies, observers of the game say. The association, which was being run by ad-hoc committees for a long time, got its elected leadership for the first time in its history in December 2011.

Tanka Anbuhang, who has no qualms about being a Maoist leader, was elected unopposed as president of the board, and Ashok Nath Pyakurel the general secretary. In June 2014, the anti-corruption body CIAA filed corruption cases against 10 board members, including the president and general secretary, accusing them of embezzling the association’s funds.

With top officials under investigation, the association was being run by acting presidents, who could not perform their duties for lack of a mandate. It was during the same time that the players resorted to protests demanding a change in leadership in the association, ad hike in their benefits. During the last few weeks (November 5, 2015) of their tenure in office, the 10 people were acquitted by the Special Court.

Following the development, the UML, the ruling party, found an opportune moment to gain a foothold in CAN, which was earlier under the ‘sphere of influence’ of the Maoists and the Nepali Congress. The Maoists, including Anbuhang, also backed the UML, at the cost of Congress sympathisers, including general secretary Pyakurel. The communist parties chose the National Sports Council as the agency to execute their design to ‘kick’ Congress out of CAN. But the main opposition Nepali Congress was in no mood to allow the ruling parties to take over the responsibility for one of the most popular sports in the country.

Nepali-Cricket-1 — Team Nepal, after the win against Namibia in the recently held ICC World Cricket League. Photo: OnlineKhabar

Congress supporters within the association organised a general assembly, and elected Congress leader Chatur Bahadur Chand as president.

The National Sports Council, which is a government body, did not recognise Chand’s election. Instead of taking the initiative to settle the differences between the Anbuhang and Chand groups, the NSC formed its own ad-hoc committee, with UML sympathiser Ramesh Siwlal as the board president. NSC Member Secretary Keshav Bista says the move was taken with the consent of the ICC. The tussle between the ad-hoc committee led by the Ramesh Silwal and the ‘elected committee’ led by Chand has reached the court, and who will lead the association is now for the judges to decide.

On April 25, the ICC decided to suspend CAN saying it could no longer tolerate government interference in the administration of the sport.

The three options

Sources told Onlinekhabar that under the first option, the ‘elected’ CAN (led by Chatur Bahadur Chand) will withdraw a case it filed at the Supreme Court against the National Sports Council, and a small team will be formed to hold fresh elections.

Under the second option, the National Sports Council (NSC) will recognise the annual general meeting of CAN (held in Kathmandu in December). The ‘elected’ CAN will have to agree to allow associations in Kailali and Sunsari to select their representatives again. NSC had particularly objected to the selection process in the two districts.

Under the third option, NSC will have to vacate its notices to form the ad-hoc committee and freeze CANs’ bank accounts. The elected CAN will then nominate members recommended by the NSC to the board. Such people could even become vice-presidents.

The second and third options can offer a way out. For that, NSC will have to relent. Will the sports governing body do that in the interest of Nepal’s increasingly popular sport?

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