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Wehby to head CWI Corporate Governance Committee

Published:Thursday | April 18, 2019 | 12:29 AM
Cricket West Indies president Ricky Skerritt (right) shares a light moment with Jamaica Cricket Association president W. Billy Heaven (right) and Group CEO, GraceKennedy and chairman of CWI’s Corporate Governance Committee, Senator Don Wehby, after a high level meeting at the Terra Nova All-Suite Hotel yesterday morning.
Cricket West Indies president Ricky Skerritt (right) shares a light moment with Jamaica Cricket Association president W. Billy Heaven (right) and Group CEO, GraceKennedy and chairman of CWI’s Corporate Governance Committee, Senator Don Wehby, after a high level meeting at the Terra Nova All-Suite Hotel yesterday morning.

Cricket West Indies (CWI) will be revisiting the Patterson and Wilkins Reports, and others, as part of its plan to restructure the governance of the sport regionally.

Ricky Skerritt, who was elected CWI president at its annual general meeting, last month, has been effecting immediate change to the personnel responsible for the body’s executive and technical operations. One of these is Senator Don Wehby, who has been appointed chairman of CWI’s Governance Committee, a task force set up to review the reports and make relevant changes based on its findings.

The Patterson report, compiled by former Prime Minister of Jamaica Percival James Patterson, was commissioned by former Cricket West Indies president Ken Gordon, in 2007, to examine the structure of West Indies cricket and suggest improvements.

It made 65 recommendations, which were dismissed as ‘outdated’ by Julian Hunte, who replaced Gordon soon after the report was commissioned.

Former Windies cricketer Charles Wilkin also submitted a report suggesting improvements to regional cricket, and it was also rejected by previous CWI administrations.

Skerritt, Cricket West Indies Chief Executive Officer Johnny Grave, and its Director of Cricket Jimmy Adams, met with Wehby and Jamaica Cricket Association president Wilford ‘Billy’ Heaven at the Terra Nova Hotel in St Andrew yesterday morning to discuss the appointment, and other methods of taking cricket forward in the Caribbean.

Full support

Wehby said that he is confident in the job he will do, as he has the full support of Skerritt and the CWI board, as a whole, and good governance will ultimately improve the performance of the Windies teams at each level.

“I was asked to put a team together to revisit the report I did in 2016, which I will do shortly, and I’ll make an announcement of who is on that team,” Wheby told The Gleaner.

“The president, Ricky Skerritt, was very supportive of implementation of the report, so I’ll take it from there.

“ I need to have a discussion with a few of the executives in the CWI just to see what has been done since then, and then I’ll have my meeting.

Whatever I take on as a task, I like to do it 100 per cent. My passion for West Indies cricket is very high, and, hopefully, I’ll do a good job in terms of execution.

“Before I was the chairman of the Audit, Risk and Compliance Committee, a Corporate Governance Committee was formed specifically to look at five reports to see how we can implement those recommendations: the Patterson Report, the Wilkins Report, and others,” he said. “We, at that time, engaged Pricewaterhouse Coopers (a global auditing firm).

“They did a pretty good report, but based on the briefing that I got from the new president, not much was done regarding implementation.

“So he has asked me to chair the Corporate Governance Committee to ensure that the recommendations of these reports are implemented.”

R.P.