Thilanga Sumathipala could be having the last laugh after his camp spearheaded by Mohan de Silva (secretary elect) and Shammi Silva (president elect) secured the top two positions at Sri Lanka Cricket when the long awaited election of office-bearers to administer the sport was held yesterday.
Colombo Cricket Club’s Shammi Silva was elected the president of Sri Lanka Cricket by securing 83 votes while his rival Jayantha Dharmadasa was only able to obtain 56 votes.
Former captain Arjuna Ranatunga who contested the vice president’s post lost to Ravin Wickremaratne who had a 10-vote lead while K. Mathivanan was also elected as a vice president.
Meanwhile, Ranatunga’s brother Nishantha Ranatunga also lost his bid to become the secretary against Mohan de Silva as he polled a poor 43 votes compared to Mohan de Silva who commanded 96 votes.
The assistant secretary’s post went to Krishantha Kapukotuwa with 94 votes while Hirantha Perera was left struggling with 44 votes.
Only K. Mathivanan from the Dharmadasa clan was able to be elected to office.
Representing Sinhalese Sports Club Lasantha Wickramasinghe received the highest votes at the election, garnering 100 votes to defeat Easman Narangoda (37 votes) for the post of treasurer. The assistant treasurer’s post was won by Lalith Rambukwella obtaining 92 votes beating Sanjaya Senarath who received only 42 votes.
The International Cricket Council had been pressurizing Sri Lanka to hold a democratic election as early as possible after the government dismissed the previous administration and cancelled the election over allegations of fraud and corruption.
Speaking after the election Jayantha Dharmadasa said he lost as did Sri Lanka Cricket.
“We revealed the reasons behind all the corruption at SLC but we lost and it reveals that there are issues in the SLC election,” he said.
Sharing his opinion on the election Nishantha Ranatunga said he always stood with Sri Lanka Cricket in its development.
“Our cricket team has declined in performance and if this is alright with the clubs that voted, we regret it. We don’t blame our stake holders because they also face problems if they don’t support them (those who won),” said Nishantha Ranatunga
Arjuna Ranatunga as usual said it was a sad situation for the country that Thilanga Sumathipala’s team had won.
“This is such a sad situation. Even our President Maithripala Sirisena can’t win the SLC election due to the SLC system,” said Arjuna Ranatunga who is the Minister of Transport.
Minister of Sports Harin Fernando said the election was a success and thanked his ministry officials.
“We wanted to conduct the election after sorting out all issues of corruption but due to the pressure brought on by ICC we decided not to delay the election.
He hinted once again of “constitutional changes” to SLC that will have to be presented in Parliament.
President-elect Shammi Silva said: “We had to face a lot of obstacles during the nomination process but our members stood firm with us and finally democracy won.
“We will always respect the Sri Lanka judicial system. If found guilty by court, we will step down. Thanks to Minister of Sports Harin Fernando for conducting the election in a peaceful manner,” said Silva.
Secretary-elect Mohan de Silva said: “We have worked with a lot of progressive plans but due to this election blunder nine months of progress were halted. We need to re-build SLC and before we move into office we will do a proper audit for the past nine months as there was a three billion rupees profit at the time we left and an Interim Committee took over,” said de Silva.
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