COLOMBO, March 25: Sri Lanka’s cricket board has been dissolved by the government for the third time since 1999, the sports minister has announced.

A six-man interim committee of prominent businessmen headed by Jayantha Dharmadasa, who took part in board president elections in 2000, has been appointed to take immediate control of the administration.

“There have been many complaints regarding financial mismanagements at Sri Lanka Cricket and after looking at the accounts I found out that everything was not all right,” sports minister Jeevan Kumaratunga told reporters on Thursday night.

“There have been a lot of wastages and seems to be no accountability. The board faced a tight financial crisis in the future because of unnecessary expenditure and it is my duty to put cricket back on track.”

The other members of the committee are secretary Tryphon Mirando, treasurer Kumar Weerasuriya, Rienze Wijetilleke, Adel Hassim and Damien Fernando.

Wijetilleke was chairman of a previous interim committee in 1999-2000.

There had been speculation all week about a government takeover following the decision to replace Thilanga Sumathipala as Sri Lanka’s official representative with the International Cricket Council midway through an ICC executive meeting in Delhi last week.

The sudden dissolution prevents Sumathipala, the most prominent Sri Lankan cricket administrator of the last decade, standing for a fifth term as president during the board’s annual elections this weekend.

The new management team’s first task will be to appoint committees to oversee the board’s various departments. They will unveil their plans early next week.—Reuters