Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, has filed a motion to have the injunctions against the Guyana Cricket Administration Act (GCAA) lifted and duly enforced.
This is according to Minister of Culture Youth and Sport, Charles Ramson Jr.
Ramson Jr., made the disclosure during the 2020 Budget debates on Thursday.
“Through the Attorney General, a motion has been filed and we will be having the Cricket Administration Act restored to its original condition and fully enforced in a matter of days,” he said.
The GCAA was passed in parliament on May 15, 2014 establishing the Guyana Cricket Board [GCB] as not only a legal, corporate body but as the supreme organization for the administration of the sport.
“The Cricket Bill was passed with the support of both sides of the house. The APNU had supported the PPP because it was in a minority situation at that time, so it had the support of both sides of the house,” said Ramson Jr.
The new Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport added that there was a challenge to that cricket bill and a few years after the challenge at the Court of Appeal, the minister, who had responsibility for Culture, Youth and Sport, went to the Court of Appeal, along with the Attorney General and consented to the provisions being suspended in the act.
In the last decade, several issues were taken to the courts over the administration of the sport including the validity of elections and the appointment of the Cricket Ombudsman.
In 2018, Justice Navindra Singh upheld the constitutionality of the GCAA but soon after that, the GCB appealed the ruling of Justice Singh and was successful in getting Justice Dawn Gregory-Barnes to stay certain sections of the Act.
The court ordered that “the effect and operation of the Guyana Cricket Administration Act be stayed save and except for section 6, 10 and 17 thereof and clauses 5,6,7,8,9,10, 17 and 18 of Schedule of the Cricket Administration Act until hearing and determination of the summons,” and a motion was filed to quash the ruling of Justice Gregory-Barnes.
The GCB then held elections later in January of this year.
The following month, an injunction was filed to stop those elected from holding themselves out as office bearers of the GCB.
In 2019, Cricket West Indies president, Ricky Skerritt, visited Guyana after he took office and during that visit, Skerritt stated, “Obviously the Guyana situation is troubling, it’s a little awkward and, at the moment, riddled with uncertainty,” he had said.
Based on the GCAA, the first elections of the GCB by law should be called by the Minister of Sport in consultation with Cricket West Indies (CWI) which was then known as the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB).
