April 30, 2008	Wednesday	Rabi-us-Sani 23, 1429

LAHORE, April 29: While the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) claims it has Rs4.8 billion in its coffers, a board’s document reveals the total bank balances as on Jan, 30, 2008 are just Rs2.48 billion, with a decline of seven per cent against the amount laid in the kitty as on Nov 30, 2007.

The PCB chief Dr Nasim Ashraf, along with the Chief Operating Officer Shafqat Naghmi, had informed the Senate Standing Committee on Sports last week that the bank balances had been doubled in his tenure as it were just Rs2 billion when he took over the charge in October 2006.

Moreover, the document indicates there is a seven per cent decline in the total balances as against Rs2,661 million which was on Nov 30, 2007.

How the PCB earned almost Rs2.48 billion in just three months (from Feb 1, 2008 till the Senate’s committee meeting) is a million dollar question.

During this period the PCB hosted a series against Bangladesh, which resulted in losses.

“A very large proportion of the total bank balances (Rs733 million, or 30 per cent) are placed on maturities of one month and three months deposits as well as on savings and current accounts, as shown below:

“The three-month deposits are Rs383,000,000, which is 15 per cent of the total balances. The one-month deposit stands at Rs230,000,000, having nine per cent share of the total balances.

“Similarly, saving account carries Rs89,205,775 with four per cent share and current account has in its fold Rs31,409,042, just one per cent of the total balances.”

According to the document, the PCB’s finance sub-committee had recommended the PCB that all the above balances should be placed on deposits of longer maturities — of at least six months and above in order to obtain better rates of return.

Moreover, the documents obtained by Dawn disclosed the PCB had opened accounts in 20 different banks in which most are smaller and the sub-committee advised the board to limit it to just five or six.

“The relationship should be limited to five or six large banks one of which may be foreign — with superlative credit ratings.

However, it is observed that banking relations have been initiated with several new banks —some of them regional at random locations in Lahore with the number of total banks now almost 20.

Moreover, more disturbingly, the large highly-rated banks such as National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) and the MCB are conspicuous by their absence, while the other market leaders such as HBL and UBL are being phased out and replaced by smaller banks such as Soneri, Habib Metropolitan, NIB, Bank of Khyber, My Bank, Arif Habib, Soneri and Atlas etc,” the finance committee had objected.

Though the PCB media director Sohail Mansoor could not be contacted directly despite various attempts, his number two media official Raza Rashid said that he was unable to comment on the news, without consulting the finance department, which is possible only on Wednesday.