Sports Minister wants complete control of PCB

“The director-general,the chief selector,the national team coach are all giving out statement after statement and there appears to be no one to check them and all this is creating a lot of confusion,” Jillani had said.

He said there was need to bring the Board under the Sports Ministry to control its lavish spendings and also make the paid employees more accountable,who were creating unnecessary controversies with their statements.

Ever since the resignation of Nasim Ashraf as PCB Chairman last August,the Sports Ministry is getting involved in cricket affairs although for years the PCB has functioned independently.

Sources said that Jillani’s anger at the Board perhaps had something to do with the fact that he was initially offered the post of PCB Chairman but he turned it down and might be regretting it now.

Sources say Jillani,a veteran member of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party,had few months back turned down the offer to head the board because he belonged to a group of PPP members who were not happy with the way President Asif Zardari was conducting party and government affairs.

“But now that many of the members of that protesting group have been accommodated in the government and given more respect,Jillani feels he should have accepted the Board position,” one source close to him said.

The source said there were people who were now pushing him to put the board directly under the control of the ministry to make it more accountable.

Former Test pacer Sarfraz Nawaz was also in favour of putting the Board under the direct control of the Ministry.

“There is need to have some check and balance on the working of the Board and its affairs,” Nawaz said.

Critics point out Butt has mainly accommodated his loyalists and those former players,who were critical of the Ashraf set up.