A former PCB chief executive officer has expressed disappointment over the way Pakistan cricket is being run by an inefficient set of officials led by Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Ijaz Butt.
In an article for the Daily Times, Colonel (retired) Rafi Nasim said that when Butt took over as PCB chairman, there was hope and expectation for better times as he was himself a former cricketer and administrator.
But now, there is a huge sense of disappointment over Butt's management style and decisions, he adds.
"Considering the fact that Ijaz was a former cricketer as well as an administrator his appointment was hailed by the cricket fraternity but he disappointed all and sundry more than his non-cricketing predecessors," claims Nasim.
"His three years period on the PCB throne has, however, been absolutely disgusting in all respects, especially the grooming and character building of young players which brought shame and embarrassment to the whole nation," he adds.
He believes that Butt is looking to become a dictator with overwhelming powers, and in the process, he is destroying "all the unity, strength, discipline and harmony both among the players as well as the officials."
He questions Butt's decision to reject the 63 recommendations of the ICC appointed Pakistan Task Team (PTT) to improve Pakistan cricket.
Warning that not accepting the recommendations will ruin Pakistan cricket further, Nasim says the PCB must analyse the PTT report wisely and find methods to improve the cricket administration, raising standards of the game and eliminating irregularities, faults and follies.
"It is a matter of shame that Pakistan cricket administration degenerated to such an extent that the International Cricket Council (ICC), the governing body of world cricket, had to intervene," he says.
"In my opinion, which is based on vast experience of handling cricket affairs from a club to international levels, the disgraceful situation that our cricket is facing is the result of our own making," he adds.
"The deterioration has not occurred overnight. Though the present set up of the PCB has broken all records of inefficiency and corruption, the things have taken a decade or so in coming to the lowest ebb. The major factor responsible for making a laughing stock of our cricket in the world has been the appointment of incompetent heads of the cricket board by the President of Pakistan in his capacity as patron-in-chief of the PCB," Nasim says further.
While admitting that the present system has worked pretty well for almost half a century with the Pakistan president as the patron, there is a need for an urgent revamp and get political appointees out of the cricket organizational system. (ANI)
