Papon becomes BCB president for fourth time

Nazmul Hassan Papon was elected the president of Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) on Thursday, just a day after he grabbed highest votes to be the director in the board of directors election.

After the election commission published the results officially today at the BCB’s headquarters at Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium, AJM Nasir Uddin, a director from the Chattogram Division, proposed Papon’s name as the president and his proposal was supported by two directors-Enayet Hossain Siraj and Gazi Golam Mortuza Pappa.

It was the third straight time, Papon was elected BCB president, while its his fourth term in BCB as its chief.

Nazmul Hassan Papon became the president of the country’s most influential sporting body after being nominated by the government in 2012 when the then BCB president AHM Mustafa Kamal became the ICC president. As ICC made it mandatory to elect president by an election for its all member countries, the BCB changed its constitution, paving the way of election in this post.

However, Papon became the first elected president in BCB’s history in 2013 and then again was elected in 2017.

As per the constitution, 25-elected directors would elect a president amongst them. But in 2013 and 2017 election, Papon was elected unopposed.

This is the first time, he had to contest in election but shined in impeccably, bagging highest 53 votes alongside Enayet Hossain Siraj and Gazi Golam Mortuza Pappa.

The councillors yesterday elected 12 directors from the Category-2 that involved Dhaka Metropolitan Clubs, including Papon, the councillor of Abahani Limited. The rest of the 11 elected directors are- Gazi Golam Mortuza Pappa, Enayet Hossain Siraj, Ismail Haider Mallick, Najib Ahmed, Obeid Rashid Nijam, Fahim Sinha, Iftekhar Rahman Mithu, Salahuddin Chowdhury, Manzur Kader, Mahbub Anam and Manzur Alam Manzu.

A total of 16 councillors contested in this category with Saiful Islam Bhuiyan, Rafiqul Islam, Abdur Rahman and Masuduzzman tasting the defeat.

The BCB also saw an election in Category-1 that included districts and divisions. Four contestants contested for the two director posts of Dhaka Division but Bangladesh’s first Test captain Naimur Rahman Durjoy and Tanvir Ahmed Titu emerged as victorious, claiming identical 17 votes.

The rest of the two candidates Syed Ashfakul Islam Titu and Khalid Hossain withdrew their nomination, but they opted out of the election after the date of the withdrawal of nomination, their names were printed in the ballot paper.

Election was also held in Rajshahi division where former skipper Khaled Mashud Pilot and organizer Saiful Alam Swapon Chowdhury contested. The latter, however, triumphed to be elected for the third consecutive time.

Earlier, seven directors, all from Categroy-1 were elected unopposed.

While the election in the Categroy-2 was the center of all attraction, the Categroy-3 election also hogged the limelight with Nazmul Abedin Fahim, a veteran cricket coach challenging Khaled Mahmud Sujon. The election in this Category which involved public university, former cricketers and government agencies was believed to be intense, but former skipper Khaled Mahmud Sujon achieved a landslide victory. He was elected, claiming 37 votes while his opposite number Nazmul Abedin Fahim got only three votes.

National Sports Council (NSC), meanwhile, nominated two directors – Ahmed Sajjadul Alam Booby and Jalal Younus.

The board of directors will run the BCB for the next four years.

Source: BSS