Tony Becca, Contributing EditorWEST INDIES cricket is never without controversy. In fact, more and more it seems that West Indies cricket and controversy are synonymous.
When, for example, it is not the players versus the board, it is the board versus the players, and every time that happens it is West Indies cricket that suffers.
The latest controversy, however, has nothing to do with the board and the players or with the players and the board. It has to do with Cricket World Cup 2007, with two leaders, with Rawle Brancker and Chris Dehring - the two men who, as the chairman and as the managing director and CEO, were selected to run things and who, from their first press conference, had promised, almost in one voice, to make World Cup 2007 the best ever.
Despite all the denials that it was not so and that it was nothing but the imagination of malicious people, it was known from the beginning that there was no love lost between the two.
Eventually it reached a stage where neither one was prepared to work with the other . The board, more than once, had to step in like a referee, and it ended up with Brancker, who many believed was about to be removed, handing in his resignation and with the board accepting it.
That, however, was not the end of the quarrel between Brancker and Dehring, and the way things seem to be heading, something had better be done about it - not only to protect one from the other, but also to protect the image, the integrity of West Indies cricket.
ACCUSATIONS
Up to the exit of Brancker, the accusations from both men were that the other was incompetent and was a law unto himself.
As bad as that was, however, it is not as bad as it is now.
A few days ago, Brancker called on the heads of Govern-ment of CARICOM, to intervene - to authorise an independent 'due diligence' and 'forensic' audit into the management transactions of CWC 2007.
In a letter that was sent to the chairman of CARICOM, Kenny Anthony, to the chairman of CARICOM's Prime Ministerial Sub-Committee on Cricket, Keith Mitchell, to the Prime Minister of Barbados, Owen Arthur, and copied to board president, Ken Gordon, Brancker requested that the audits should be done by a company other than that which now does the annual audit for CWC 2007, and that they should be done on every transaction.
Brancker also suggested that an internal auditor be employed, that he reports directly to the chairman, and also that he does an audit regularly.
According to Brancker, the exercise was necessary "in an effort to be totally satisfied that all the preparation activity done so far employed the best-use practice and were all conducted with the utmost transparency and accountability", and nothing is wrong with that.
LAW UNTO HIMSELF
Although board president Gordon has said that in all the discussions he did not hear one charge of managerial incompetence, financial impropriety or the lack of accountability levelled against Dehring, and that, on the contrary, his competence was generously praised, the problem is that it seems as if Brancker is accusing Dehring of something more than incompetence or of being a law unto himself, and if that is what he is doing, the board must act - and quickly at that.
Without getting into the smear on Dehring's character if the apparent accusation is not true, it would be embarrassing to West Indies cricket if it were true - and there is no question about that.
With all the problems involving the players and the board, the board and its sponsors, past and present, West Indies cricket can do without a scandal of this nature, and the only way to stop it, the only way to protect the integrity of West Indies cricket and to ensure that World Cup 2007 has a real chance of being the best ever, is to do what Brancker has suggested be done.
By doing so, the board will find out if Dehring is guilty of anything or if Brancker is simply being mischievous. In fact, based on what Gordon has said, Dehring should insist that the board, or whoever, does what Brancker wants to be done.
