Documents related to the audit can be accessed electronically, and the audit is expected to continue for the next 90 days
While it’s far from business as usual at Cricket South Africa, operations at the organisation continue, and that includes the forensic audit into the organisation and specifically its suspended chief executive, Thabang Moroe.
Cricket SA’s current interim chief executive, Jacques Faul, said on Tuesday that the organisation’s financial position remains critical, but that position hadn’t changed as a result of anything related to the Covid-19 pandemic. Cricket SA suspended all cricket related activities for 60 days on Monday, effectively bringing an end to the 2019/20 season.
The organisation will hold a meeting this weekend to decide what to do about its various domestic competitions, including the two franchise competitions; the Momentum Cup and the Four-Day Franchise Challenge, which were due to end in the next few weeks.
Faul confirmed that other critical matters, like the forensic audit, would continue. “The team doing that is a small one anyway and unless they request it, then it will be called off. But they haven’t. Everything in that regard is continuing as normal,” said Faul.
Documents related to the audit can be accessed electronically, and the audit is expected to continue for the next 90 days.
Cricket SA’s chief medical officer, Dr Shuaib Manjra, is chairing a steering committee to advise the organisation on how many people are needed at its head office, and who will be able to work remotely from home.
Provincial affiliates like Border, Western Province, Central Gauteng and Free State have in some cases closed their respective stadiums and all are working with a skeleton staff in line with measures outlined by the government to aid in slowing the spread of the virus.
While sections of English cricket have begun expressing concerns about the financial hit the sport is likely to take in that country with the season there nearing its start, Faul said the sport here was in a sense lucky that the measures to halt social activities came at the end of the season.
“This pandemic is obviously a crisis, but from the perspective of how it affects us financially, we got lucky, because our season was virtually finished. Income is tied up with in-coming tours and we’re not due to host again until August/September,” said Faul.
Given everything that has happened to the sport locally in 2019/20 season – and specifically him being parachuted into the chief executive position in December, following Moroe’s suspension – Faul described the summer as the “most challenging season” that he could remember.
“We are working through a number of issues still, it has been a very tough year for us,” he added.
