| Sports |
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| SLC blinks in Ten Sports deal |
| By S.R. Pathiravithana |
The crisis over the Ten Sports TV rights deal took a dramatic turn this week with the SLC seeking a compromise after the Paris based International Chamber of Commerce, a World Court of arbitration threatened to sue Sri Lanka Cricket to the tune of UC$ 300million if the deal was not honoured.
The International Chambers came following a petition filed by Ten Sports this week.
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| Arjuna Ranatunga |
Jayantha Dharmadasa |
The letter of demand was sent to SLC Interim Committee Chairman Arjuna Ranatunga and three other members of the IC referred to the demands of the Ten Sports, the rights holder prior to the cancellation of the contract, and warned that the SLC would be sued.
It is learnt, the cash-strapped SLC may appoint a committee to look into the matter again.
A cricket official said the SLC was not in a position to pay such a huge amount and it could also mean that the SLC had to declare bankruptcy.
Early last week the entire SLC interim committee and the three-member probe committee comprising Dr. Maiya Gunasekera, B.L.H. Perera and the Sports Ministry secretary S. Liyanagama met Ten Sports CEO Chris McDonald in Colombo to look into ways of renegotiating deal with Ten Sports, but they failed to enter into a compromise and decided to call for fresh bids for TV rights.
In July this year Sports Minister Gamini Lokuge instructed the SLC to cancel the addendum signed by former Interim Committee Chairman Jayantha Dharmadasa and SLC CEO, Duleep Mendis that extended the Ten Sports rights from 2009 to 2012.
In an earlier discussion with The Sunday Times the former SLC Interim Committee chairman Jayantha Dharmadasa said that he saw no flaws in the deal that he signed up with Ten Sports and it had the full backing of the IC.
This is not the first occasion that the SLC had burned its fingers on the cancelling of TV rights. The previous SLC interim committee paid US $ 5 million to WSG Nimbus in a similar case after an earlier administration cancelled the deal.
If fresh bids were called Pakistani TV Company ARY Gold which lost out to Ten Sports in the 2004 original negotiations is almost certain of bidding afresh. |
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