International Cricket Council must hold Board of Control for Cricket in India fully accountable: Ehsan Mani
Former ICC President feels the incident is a wake-up call
Dubai: Ehsan Mani, the former President of the International Cricket Council (ICC), wants the world cricket body to hold the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) fully accountable for the spot fixing scandal that has rocked the cricket world.
Speaking to Gulf News from London, Mani said: “The ICC as the Governing body of cricket has to ensure that it takes the lead and holds BCCI fully accountable.”
Elaborating on the role that every country should play in the incident to lift the reputation of the game, Mani said: “The ICC and all the countries whose players and officials participate in IPL must demand that the full extent of the corruption is brought out in to the open and very robust independent safeguards are put in place going forward.
“The BCCI, for its part, must demonstrate it’s commitment to a zero tolerance policy towards corruption.”
Mani strongly believes that the Independent Governance Review of the ICC recommendations made by Lord Woolf should be considered. Incidentally, the BCCI was responsible for rejecting some of the key recommendations of Lord Woolf’s report.
“It is also a wake-up call for ICC to revisit the recommendations of the Woolf Report which has been gathering dust and for BCCI to take a critical look at its governance and ensure there is transparency in its decision making processes,” added Mani, who is a Chartered Accountant by profession and had strongly advocated for transparency in cricket administration.
Mani is not shocked by the IPL spot-fixing scandal though. “I was not surprised; it was only a matter of time for this to happen. I am aware that ICC had expressed it’s concerns after the first edition of IPL. Since then, I understand, ICC’s Anti-Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU) involvement increased. However the host Board, BCCI, is ultimately responsible for implementing the anti-corruption procedures.”
Mani is surprised that IPL franchises did not follow any methods to check corruption in the game.
“I was quite shocked to learn that the IPL franchises did not have their own anti-corruption or security units. This begs the question; how long that spot fixing in IPL going on for? The integrity of IPL has been undermined. It has also exposed the weak governance processes within BCCI,” he said.
When asked if the ICC anti-corruption unit may have periodically warned the BCCI and if the latter had ignored it, Mani said: “I cannot speculate on what transpired between ICC and BCCI. However, both BCCI and ICC now need to ensure that there is complete transparency and nothing is swept under the carpet.”
