The Cricket SA interim board on Tuesday decided unanimously to remove former player Omphile Ramela as a director. Picture: Ryan Wilkisky, BackpagePix
JOHANNESBURG – The majority of Cricket SA’s interim Board of Directors voted to remove Omphile Ramela as a director on Tuesday after Ramela failed to appear at a meeting to answer allegations where his conduct was to be discussed.
Five of the formerly nine-member board voted in favour of removing Ramela, who was charged last week with breaches of the Companies Act, related to his conduct as a board member. Two directors; Haroon Lorgat and Stavros Nicolaou missed the meeting, while Professor André Odendaal abstained.
Ramela had been offered the opportunity to attend a meeting to answer the charges against him, and initially chose to do so, but when contacted this week, by the board, failed to answer. In his absence he was removed from the board.
Last week, the board released a 23-page statement in which it outlined how Ramela had undermined the work of the board, particularly as it related to the suspension of Cricket SA’s company secretary Welsh Gwaza. He was accused of leaking information to Gwaza and sections of the media.
The board’s chairman, Zak Yacoob, accused Ramela of being “obstructive,” and said he was shocked by the conduct of the former president of the SA Cricketers Association, which represents the country’s professional players. “He’s a young man, who believes that every word that comes out of his mouth is the biblical truth and that if anybody begins to disagree with a word he says you are greeted with a great deal of anger,” Yacoob told the media last week.
Ramela, also last week following what was then still a suspension, said he was being victimised. “I’ve been constantly asking the tough questions,” Ramela said. “Some people are comfortable with that, some people are not. That’s been my position on the board. Everyone knows I ask the tough questions, but it seems my colleagues weren’t happy with that.”
Meanwhile Gwaza’s disciplinary hearing following his suspension, which was due to start Monday, has been pushed back to Thursday following a request from Gwaza.
On Monday, the interim board announced that it had suspended acting CEO, Kugandrie Govender, for her role in the revocation of the accreditation of five journalists, various breaches of the Companies Act and her role in the dismissal of CSA’s former head of sales and sponsor relations, Clive Eksteen.
Following his axing Eksteen, took CSA to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration, and won his case before that body last week, for wrongful dismissal.
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