- Lanka in top tier of AR and hosting NZ 85kg team his crowning glory
The official tenure of the Director General (DG) of Sports of the Sports Development Department affiliated to the Ministry of Sports, Shemal Fernando, ended yesterday (13), The Daily Morning Sports, learns.
Fernando, according to sports Ministry sources, had served a one-and-a-half-year stint and was famously installed as the Competent Authority (CA), to oversee four dissolved sports institutions by ex-Sports Minister Harin Fernando.
Harin Fernando suspended Sri Lanka Rugby (SLR), Netball Federation of Sri Lanka (NFSL) Sri Lanka Automobile Sports (SLAS) and the Cycling Federation of Sri Lanka (CFSL) respectively, on 29 May 2024 over their collective failure to hold their election of office bearers before the annual cutoff date 31 May.
Afterwards Shemal Fernando, an ex-athlete from Royal, functioned as the CA, for the defunct four sports federations, with the suspended officials of the federations subsequently instituting legal action against the DG concerned.
The litigations are pending in Court to date, with the case concerning Sri Lanka Rugby having almost reached the stage of a resolution after a lapse of one-year, following the intervention of the sport’s global governing body-World Rugby and its regional ruling body, Asia Rugby.
Shemal Fernando – a retired Rear Admiral of Sri Lanka Navy and a Ph.D. Professor, presided over Sri Lanka’s entry to the top tier of Asia Rugby this year, alongside the likes of Hong Kong, Korea and the UAE, after the national team won the Division-1 Championship under now-retired Suhiru Anthony last year.
Another feather in his cap was Sri Lanka hosting a representative level rugby team from New Zealand in the Under-85 kg category for the first time in over a century last May.
The two-match Test series proved to be a resounding success in terms of spectator patronage at both Nittawela and Colombo, while providing adequate international exposure to the national players, ahead of the Asia Rugby Emirates Men’s Championship-2025.
The ‘Tuskers’ ultimately flattered to deceive in the said Championship, finishing bottom of the pile after losses to Korea, Hong Kong and the UAE, which has now forced them to feature in a relegation play-off against Division-1 champions Malaysia.
The cases filed against Shemal Fernando by the officials of the dissolved sporting bodies NFSL, SLAS and CFSL are pending in Court, but informed sources added that the case concerning the NFSL was nearing a resolution.
However, it was not immediately clear as to what the fate of the cases were, linked to the Sri Lanka Automobile Sports and the Cycling Federation respectively.
As reported in media at the time, the outgoing Sports Ministry DG also courted unwarranted controversy with the former Treasurer of the SLAS Upulwan Serasinghe, who publicly challenged him to disclose his credentials when he laid claim to being both a doctor and professor. However, Fernando continued unperturbed insisting that he has nothing to hide concerning his doctorate or his professorship and vowed that he would only do so at an apt forum, and not merely at the insistence of ‘disgruntled officials’, as he put it at the time.
The Assistant Director General (ADG) of the Sports Ministry is expected to serve in the DGs post in an acting capacity, till the subject minister receives Cabinet approval to fill up the vacant portfolio, as is required by the Sports Law.