The most honest sport in Sri Lanka. Gambling on distant horses.
The Daily Mirror website gets good interviews and really doesn’t take advantage. This interview with Sports Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage is pretty bad. I’m struck by two things, one is that the Minister talks about problems in sports administration as if he’s not in charge, and also by how ignorant the interviewer Hafeel Hariz is.
Aluthgamage asks the interviewer if he has any specific allegations of corruption. Hariz says something general about everything being politicized, and nothing about say, the head of the Cricket Board also being the CEO of the channel awarded the TV contract. Or the recent T20 ticket nonsense where paying customers were booted, reportedly for VVIPs.
They also brush over the fact that the Cricket Board is paying someone $100,000 a month to tell them how to manage their finances better. Which is, well, which should explain itself. All the stuff that’s bad in Sri Lanka sports, the Minister addresses like he’s a spectator. Everything good was done by him.
Then he’s also saying that CSN (Carlton Sports Network, named after Mahinda’s family home, run by his son’s girlfriend, and headed by Nishantha Ranatunga, also the Secretary of the Cricket Board)… went on to long there, he’s just spewing nonsense, saying that they advertised for the cricket rights and no one else advertised. The gall. You know why MTV Channel One became MTV Sports? Because the government tried to rig the requirements for carrying the Olympics, saying that only dedicated sports channels could carry them, AKA, Carlton Sports Network. So MTV changed to MTV Sports, somewhat nonsensically. Things are completely rigged.
Asking the Sports Minister what’s wrong with Sri Lankan sport is like asking the fox about recent theft in the hen house. He’s appalled, just appalled, they’ve appointed a committee of more foxes.
Good write up here Indi! keep it up!
As an aside, find you have seriously improved with you short blogs, by combining insightful, analytical and thought -provoking content. Good job and do keep that impartiality going.
No allegations about corruption, what about the COPE report. This reporter is a moron.
I think the interviewer is Hafeel Fariz not Hafeel Hariz.
Simple question:
why is the most lucrative sport in SL bankrupt?
http://sundaytimes.lk/111127/Sports/spt01.html
Does that indicate a high probability of corruption? (the only reason some would build a white elephant is to make money from the construction process).
Second simple question:
Since the public finances mirror that of SLC how much longer before the country faces the same fate as the board???