Revealed: PCB’s staggering pay-scales

Employees rope in cash while board complains of financial hardship.

KARACHI:

While the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) faces financial hardship after being forced to play its home matches abroad, its employees are paid hefty salaries and awarded benefits despite a mediocre show on and off the field.

According to documents made available to The Express Tribune, six-figure salaries, fuel and phone allowances and PCB-provided vehicles are a norm.

The PCB’s Director-General and former captain, Javed Miandad, is paid Rs750,000. He also gets 450 litres of fuel, a 1,600cc car and an unlimited phone allowance per month despite not being seen in his office regularly and often speaking out against the PCB.

The PCB’s staff strength totals 523. Of them, 418 are full-time employees while the rest are contracted staff. The Ijaz Butt-led board laid off a number of staff as soon as it came to power but frequent trips abroad by officials, their daily allowances and expensive accommodation meant monetary problems existed, especially given the board’s inability to strengthen its financial state as no international cricket is being played in Pakistan.

Although the PCB was reportedly awarded a $15m compensation after it was stripped of a co-host status for the 2011 World Cup, lack of sponsors for the home series and excessive overheads incurred by playing abroad ensured the compensation failed to make inroads towards financial stability.

While the problems exist, team coach Waqar Younis, who is based in Sydney during Pakistan’s off-season, pockets Rs650,000 per month in addition to the Rs10,000 phone allowance, 200 litres of fuel and a 1600cc car. The team’s bowling coach Aqib Javed nets Rs350,000 plus allowances while team manager Intikhab Alam gets paid Rs500,000 on top of the phone and travel allowance.

It is also noteworthy that the officials accompanying the team on tour have travel and accommodation paid-for by the PCB while also getting individual daily allowances in addition to the monthly rewards handed out despite the team’s inability to move up the rankings.

While the spending continues to increase, Pakistan’s performance on the field remains unaffected and unflattering: They have won just two of their last 14 Test series – including the current one in the West Indies – and have lost seven of their last ten One-Day International series. The board has also failed to convince teams to tour Pakistan since March 2009 and while the unstable law-and-order situation in the country has failed to help matters, the chairman’s unwise, ill-timed comments once threatened to push Pakistan to the brink of obscurity from the cricketing world.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 23^rd, 2011.