District and Divisional Sports Organisers’ Forum divided ahead of BCB election
A faction of divided District and Divisional Sports Organisers’ Forum met Bangladesh Cricket Board president Nazmul Hasan on Wednesday, giving
the BCB incumbents a much-needed boost ahead of the forthcoming election.
Despite his strong backing from some Dhaka-based clubs Nazmul was struggling to make an impact on the district and divisional organisers, who have a major say in the election, due sometime in September-October.
The meeting held at the Sahara-BCB Academy was mainly attended by some rebel forum members, many of whom are deprived of any post in their respective district or divisional associations.
Two former national captains, Akram Khan and Naimur Rahman, who were eying to become a councillor from Chittagong Division and Manikganj District, also attended the meeting under the guise of root-level organisers.
‘BCB doesn’t have anything against the Divisional and District Sports Associations,’ Nazmul told reporters after the meeting. ‘But we are not going to bow down in front of Forum.’
‘The BCB election is related to all organisations but the forum, which mainly acts as a bargaining agent. It is an association within an association. That does not mean that every councillor will be selected by the Forum,’ said Nazmul.
‘It is my war against them who have literally held the country’s different sports organisations hostage in the name of Forum,’ said Nazmul.
About 30 to 35 members of different district and divisional sports associations were present at the meeting where the BCB president for the first time openly admitted his desire to contest the election.
Nazmul is expected to face a strong opposition in Saber Hossain Chowdhury, a former BCB president, who is backed by some Forum leaders. Former BCB director Dewan Shafiul Arefin is one of the protagonists in Saber’s election campaign.
Nazmul, without naming anyone, warned that he would come up with the documents of corruption done by some Forum leaders at several juncture of their career.
‘A few people who are making this sports arena, especially cricket, dirty and indulged in corruption I want to give them a clear message. We will expose all of the corruptions,’ he said
‘Those peoples are now trying to spoil the election and even trying to come in the BCB so that they can hide their corruption which they have done earlier.
‘I have seen some news on the newspapers and on the TV where some of them were giving false information regarding the election. So I thought that we, especially me, have to have some kind of interaction with the DSA vice-presidents, joint secretaries and councillors,’ he added.
Nazmul assured the DSA officials that there would be no interference from his part regarding selecting the councillors apart from one or two places.
He requested the DSA members of Chittagong and Manikganj to consider former national skipper Akram Khan and Naimur Rahman as their councillors.
‘We did not interfere in the matter of district associations regarding election issues and it’s up to them to select the councillors. Only one or two can be exceptional where we would request.
‘For example we want Akram on the board because he will help develop Bangladesh cricket, but it does not mean that Akram is already selected.
‘The districts and divisions will have the right to select either Akram someone else, The same thing applies for Durjoy [ Naimur] as well,’ he added.
AZM Nasir, an ad-hoc member, who is representing the Chittagong DSA, echoed the same opinion regarding the Forum.
‘I am also a member of the Forum but it is very sad to admit that it could not take a shape as was desired initially,’ said Nasir. ‘I hardly could remember when the Forum took initiative to place their demand for development of cricket.’
-With New Age input
