FORMER Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) chairperson Wilson Manase has criticised the Sport and Recreation Commission (SRC) over the manner they handled his hearing on the national cricket team’s tour to Pakistan last year.
BY SPORTS REPORTER
The country’s sports controlling body last November handed Manase a four-year ban from all forms of sport administration over his board’s decision to tour Pakistan, which had not been sanctioned by the government-appointed SRC.
After the tour, the SRC disciplinary committee, chaired by its board member Aisha Tsimba found Manase guilty of disregarding its authority.
However, that judgement was recently quashed by Administrative Court judge Justice Herbert Mandeya, who said the SRC had erred in the way they instigated their proceedings as they did not give Manase a chance to defend his case.
“I was hurt by the decision which SRC took and it was like they wanted to sideline me out of sports administration,” he said.
“The way I was treated by the SRC made me believe that maybe there was an unseen hand in that decision.”
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He said he was puzzled as to why an SRC would act as the jury, while she was also the aggrieved party.
Tsimba is also a commissioner at SRC, which means that she could have been conflicted to hear of the case, by virtue of SRC being the complainant.
“…. In any case, I do not understand why Aisha Tsimba, who was a lawyer, who is a lawyer sitting on the board of SRC, why she should be the judge, the jury and the executioner in a case in which she was the aggrieved part. I could even see on the day that she did this case even her attitude was not that of a person who was impartial,” Manase said.
“… judge honourable Justice Mandeya went further to indicate that the law must be changed to forbid such kind of behaviour.”
Manase took over from long-serving ZC chairperson Peter Chingoka on an interim basis in July last year.
Although he entered the fray on the back of a lot of scepticism bordering around his limited knowledge of the game, he soon won many hearts due to his inclusive approach.
In his short stint as interim chairperson, he managed to reduce ZC’s debt that stood at $22 million to about $7 million.
