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Najam Sethi has been appointed as the new Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Chairman on Thursday after Pakistan’s embarrassing 3-0 loss against England at home in the recent Test series. The series loss against England seems to be the immediate trigger for the government to act and remove former cricketer Ramiz Raja as Chairman of Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) and hand over the authority to veteran diplomat and his predecessor Najam Sethi.
England made a historic 3-0 clean sweep in Pakistan after winning the third Test match in Karachi by 8 wickets.
It was the first instance when Pakistan got completely whitewashed at home in a Test series of three or more matches. It is only the ninth instance of a visiting side completing a whitewash in a series of three or more Tests). The previous clean sweep by the visitors was also by England, when they defeated Sri Lanka 3-0 in 2018. This brought about a premature end to Ramiz Raja’s three-year tenure.
According to reports in the local media, Pakistan Prime Minster Shehbaz Sherif, also the board’s patron, appointed Sethi as the new chairman of the PCB. The PCB’s constitution permits the Prime Minister to nominate candidates for the post of chairman.
Raja took over the role in September 2021 and during his brief stint, Pakistan played two T20 World Cups and a 50-over Women’s World Cup. Pakistan made the semifinals and finals of successive T20 World Cups and played the final of the Asia Cup. It was under his leadership that Pakistan hosted England and Australia and toured New Zealand, Sri Lanka, West Indies and Zimbabwe — losing to England and Australia and winning against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. The series with West Indies and Sri Lanka was drawn.
Sethi, who is an experienced campaigner in PCB politics, had to resign as PCB chairman when former cricketer Imran Khan was elected as the Prime Minister of Pakistan in 2018. Imran appointed his 1992 world cup winning team-mate Ramiz Raja as PCB Chairman in 2018.
Sethi shared the development through his official Twitter handle, in which he claimed that Raja is no longer the PCB chief and that the 2014 constitution of ‘he nation’s board has been restored as well.
“The cricket regime headed by Ramiz Raja @iramizraja is no more. The 2014 PCB constitution stands restored. The Management Committee will work tirelessly to revive first-class cricket. Thousands of cricketers will be employed again. The famine in cricket will come to an end,” tweeted Sethi.
“I am back after four years and there is lots of work to do,” Sethi said upon arrival at Gaddafi Stadium, PCB’s HQ, on Thursday. “I am thankful to the Prime Minister because it was his wish to revive the 2014 constitution and revive departmental cricket; regions should be revived and encourage the private sector and take cricket forward. A lot has been done here over the last four years, which I don’t like to comment on. But the way we are seeing the cricket team and the problems of cricket players, we will try to solve them.
“There’s been a famine for the last four years. Tell me how many cricketers have come through domestic cricket? It looks like only PSL is supplying players. PSL is a very big international brand and we will take domestic cricket to that level too so that we can get international players from it. My primary duty is to restore the spirit of the 2014 constitution. We will meet in a day or two and then we will discuss the major issues and let you know how we will move forward,” he added.
A group of former board members and cricketers including Misbah-ul-Haq, Mohammad Hafeez, Umar Gul have been urging the government to revert to the previous domestic structure where departmental teams such as WAPDA, SNGPL and PIA were part of the first-class circuit. Imran’s orders to abolish departmental cricket, eventually stand revoked by Sharif, who succeeded him as premier.
Ramiz was in office until Wednesday and he signed off by approving Pakistan’s squad for the upcoming home Test series against New Zealand.
Besides the poor performances against England and Australia at home, Ramiz Raja was also criticised with trolls on social media regarding his comments on boycotting the ODI World Cup in India in 2023. He was brutally trolled for some of his other comments on social media as well. His handling of affairs also came in the spotlight and his critics met the government officials to get him out of PCB.
Besides the removal of Former PCB Chairman Ramiz Raja, the Pakistan government also restored the old constitution of PCB and also put in place a 14-member panel to manage PCB. Sethi will head a 14-member management committee that will take interim charge of affairs. The committee will have 120 days in which they are expected to change the PCB’s constitution, bringing back the 2014 version to replace the current one (put in place in 2019).
The 14-member body includes Shakil Sheikh (ex-PCB BoG), Gul Zada (ex-PCB BoG) Nauman Butt (ex-PCB BoG), ex-Test cricketers Haroon Rashid, Shahid Khan Afridi and Shafqat Rana, Sana Mir (ex-Pakistan women team’s captain), Aized Syed (ex-PCB director NHPC), Tanvir Ahmed (ex-president Larkana Region), Advocate Supreme Court Mustafa Ramday and Chaudhry Arif Saeed (CEO Service Industries).
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