JOHANNESBURG – Cricket South Africa risks being a victim of problems of its own making – again – as the wait for the results of a forensic audit drifts into a third week.
CSA president Chris Nenzani has set a series of deadlines, none of which have to this date been met, for either releasing the findings of the audit or giving Cricket SA’s assessment of those findings.
Cricket SA decided to conduct the independent forensic audit in the first week of December last year based on the findings of two internal reports drawn up by its social and ethics, and audit and risk committees.
Based on those reports, CSA chief executive Thabang Moroe was also suspended on full pay with the forensic audit set to investigate charges of misconduct on his part and other critical aspects of the federation’s business including, the conduct of management.
That forensic investigation only started its work in March due to all manner of administrative decisions, the most notable of which was giving the Members Council – CSA’s highest decision-making body which is composed of the 12 provincial presidents plus CSA’s vice-president and president – final oversight of the investigators’ report and not the Board of Directors.
Seven representatives of the board serve on the Members Council as well, including Nenzani and his deputy Beresford Williams.
Nenzani told media on June 16 that CSA would have a first draft of the report delivered to it on June 19, an assertion he repeated to parliament’s portfolio committee on sport, arts and culture the same day. He told the portfolio committee that “the required action can be taken as soon as possible”.
On June 30, Nenzani said: “We will certainly be able to act on the issue of the suspended chief executive on the basis of the first report.” He added that the final report had been delayed.
Subsequent inquiries saw CSA claim that findings would be announced last Thursday, which was then pushed back to “the end of the week”. That week has come and gone, as has the weekend, and CSA remain silent about the report and its findings.
Meanwhile, concern is growing in local cricket circles about CSA’s handling of the forensic audit, while Nenzani was forced to deny reports that CSA’s board changed the terms of reference for the audit at a very late stage, possibly after receiving the initial report on June 19.
“The Board cannot make changes to the terms of reference because it does not have the authority to do so. Given that the first part of the report has been concluded, the board needed authorisation from the Members’ Council to access the report in order to execute the actions it needs to take, using that report as a point of departure,” Nenzani said last Wednesday.
As of Monday, two weeks after his first deadline for announcing the findings of the initial report, Nenzani has still not explained the findings, nor why they have been delayed.
