Zaka Ashraf takes charge as chairman of PCB management committee

Zaka Ashraf, who was the favourite to become the next Pakistan Cricket Board head, on Thursday, took charge as the chairman of a new 10-member PCB management committee. The committee has been formed by the Pakistan government for a period of four months.

The management committee will hold its first meeting in Lahore on Thursday.

The decision to make Ashraf the committee head comes after PCB had to postpone the Board election after the formation of its board of governors — which elects the new chairman — was challenged in multiple courts around the country.

The government has removed PCB election commissioner Ahmed Shehzad Farooq Rana and appointed advocate supreme court Mahmood Iqbal Khakwani in his place.

The PCB election of its new chairman was postponed on June 26 after Baluchistan High Court accepted the petition of Gul Mohammad Kakar, a former member of the PCB management committee, and set a hearing for July 17.

Before former chairman Najam Sethi dropped out of the election, he formed a 10-member board of governors that also included two direct nominees from Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, the PCB patron.

Acting chairman Ahmed Shehzad Farooq Rana then changed several of the board of governors, prompting Kakar’s court challenge.

Representatives of bigger cities such as Lahore, Karachi, Rawalpindi and Peshawar were replaced by men from smaller cities such as Dera Murad Jamali, Hyderabad, Larkana and Bahawalpur.

With AP inputs