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(Photo: Adobestock)
The leadership of Cricket South Africa was forced to agree to release Fundudzi’s full forensic report to the Parliamentary Sports Portfolio Committee after a heated meeting on Tuesday.
The beleaguered Cricket South Africa (CSA), after months of evasion, was fired from a parliamentary portfolio committee after being cornered by Fundudzi’s now infamous forensic report.
CSA appeared before the committee to give an update on the state of cricket and present a summary of the Fundudzi report, but before the delegation could launch their prepared presentation, they were already in the rear.
The meeting could not continue as scheduled, portfolio committee members said, until they had unrestricted access to the full report. With that unavailable Tuesday, the CSA delegation was told to return on another date. Meanwhile, after nearly two hours of barbecue, CSA agreed to make the full report available to the committee at 4:30 p.m. on Friday, October 9.
Members of the political division, including Brian Madlingozi of the EFF, Tsepo Mhlongo of the district attorney and Nocks Seabi of the ANC, demanded the full report, calling the CSA “arrogant” and “undermining the committee.”
If the CSA thought that Monday’s release of a 46-page document report summary was going to appease the committee, they underestimated Parliament’s ire over the situation in cricket, which has left the organization in a state of leadership paralysis.
The CSA hadn’t even played a shot and was fending off a barrage of gorillas as an enthusiastic committee, clearly fed up with months of corps dysfunction, hounded them with criticism.
Chairman of the audit and risk committee of the CSA, Marius schoeman, tried to explain that the release of the full Fundudzi report could have legal ramifications. The portfolio committee wouldn’t accept any of that, ultimately forcing Schoeman to agree to Friday’s deadline. Fundudzi and not CSA attorneys Bowmans will provide copies of the report to the committee.
“The problem today is that we don’t have the forensic report that we were promised five months ago. As Parliament, we need the report that the CSA president promised us, ”said committee chair Beauty Dlulane.
However, what is not clear is whether the parliamentary delegates will sign a confidentiality agreement (NDA), which was a requirement for the CSA Council of Members delegates to see. That’s highly unlikely considering that Schoeman admitted that the CSA had passed a copy of the full report to Sports Minister Nathi Mthethwa days earlier.
The committee took the position that since Mthethwa was in possession of a copy of the report, it was no longer an internal CSA document and should be shared with Parliament. There was also a strong feeling among committee members that the forensic report was being withheld because some board members and CSA council members were involved.
“The protocol to follow is that [the] The Council of Members will confirm that the board can deliver this report to you. Fundudzi will publish it in hard copy no later than Friday, close of business, at 4:30 p.m., “said Schoeman. “If this is not done before 16:30 on Friday, I will resign.”
That latest statement from Schoeman, who joined the board this year after a series of leadership crises rocked the organization in late 2019, was revealing.
He made a judicial decision under pressure from the committee. Schoeman was saying in essence, “I am going to give you access to the full report, but I accept that you could override me. If that is the case, I will resign. “
CSA fought to reach consensus on the publication of the report
From a procedural point of view, the CSA Council of Members must accept the publication of the full document. It’s unclear if Schoeman received that mandate via email during the two-hour grid. However, what is clear is that the CSA has no choice but to make the Fundudzi report known to more than 20 people. The chance of it leaking has increased exponentially.
Schoeman tried to point out that innocent people, who are mentioned in the report, could be wrongly implicated if the report is not carefully disclosed.
“One of the critical issues considered by the audit and risk committee, which we then explain to the board, is that we have to comply with the Companies Act,” Schoeman said.
“We have had extensive discussions with outside legal advisers about the way forward. Both the external legal and audit firms of the CSA received the report directly from Fundudzi and not from the CSA. I assure you there is nothing to hide.
“There is still a lot to do, and yes, although we have done things, we have to continue on the path in front of us together with the stakeholders. There are critical things that need to be done before the annual general meeting (scheduled for December 5). “
Those “things” you referred to were issues outlined in the summary and related to 24 topics / areas that came under scrutiny. Schoeman also revealed that there had been no clear consensus on whether to publish the report in its entirety or not.
“I cannot tell you how many hours we have discussed whether the report should be made public or not,” Schoeman said. “Personally, I think the balance that we have as board members is different from the roles and responsibilities of the Council of Members. The board must comply with the Public Limited Companies Law.
“The CSA has a unique corporate structure and the Council of Members is the highest decision-making authority. The South African Companies Act has not been drafted to take into account a two-tier structure, which entails a number of complexities about how to participate and how decisions are made.
“The Council of Members must act in the best interest of those who nominated them and those they represent. The board must act in the best interest of the company: CSA non-profit company. One of the challenges is that seven of the board members are non-independent directors because they are also on the Board of Members.
“We had to balance the issue of nondisclosure and also whether it is in the best interest of the CSA to provide the report publicly. It is not standard procedure for companies that commission forensic reports to make them public. There are good legal reasons for this.
“Not only the independent directors and the board have acted in good faith with regard to the confidentiality of the report. A summary of the report was made available and that was the balance, based on legal advice. We had to exclude certain things so that it does not harm the CSA because if we do that, we will not fulfill our fiduciary obligations ”. DM
