After several months of contention, the Greater Accra Cricket Association Congress successfully organised its elections to elect Executive Board Members to steer the affairs of the regional cricket body for the next four (4) years.
The mandate of the previous Executive Board ended in May of 2018. The active involvement of the Regional Directorate of the National Sports Authority (NSA), on the 24 of September 2019, gave a directive for the old Executive Team to serve as an Interim Body with the task of organizing Congress to fill the vacant executive positions.
Previously scheduled for Saturday 14th December, and later for Saturday 28th December 2019, the Elective Congress finally took place on the 19th of September 2020 at the Theodosia Okoh Hockey Stadium under close supervision of the Regional Directorate of the National Sports Authority (NSA).
Attendance for the programme was heavily affected by an early morning downpour as eleven (11) out of the eighteen (18) expected delegates turned up to participate in the election process.
After twenty-two (22) minutes of voting, and without any incident, the election results were declared.
A total of seven (7) executive positions were vied for and the following were elected with Mr. Akoliya V.N. (Patel), an Indian cricket enthusiast, philanthropist and businessman emerging as President to lead the new Executive Board. Mr. Philip Danquah Debrah emerged as Vice President with Mr. Emmanuel Bruce-Okine and Mr. M. Madhusudanan occupying the Secretary-General and Treasurer positions respectively.
The constitution of the Greater Accra Cricket
Association requires for three (3) Executive Member positions which were won by Mr. Amoluk Singh Sehmbi, Mr. Samson Kwasi Awe Awiah and Mr. Henry Nii Sackey.
The elected Executives were inducted into office by the Regional Director, National Sports Authority (NSA), Mr. Mr. E. R. Iddrisu. In his congratulatory speech, he urged the newly elected officers to portray themselves as a working executive that would organize numerous programmes and work towards spreading the game of Cricket to other parts of Greater Accra region.
He invited GACA to organize a demonstration game for the next Inter-District Sports Festival scheduled to take place in Ada and ended with the assurance that he would be available to attend major events of GACA while the Technical Director of the Regional Sports Authority would be available to patronize and monitor GACA’s tournaments and competitions.
The President elect, Akoliya V.N. (Patel), in his acceptance speech, thanked all stakeholders who had made the Congress possible. He noted that, the elected Executives had a passion for Cricket and hence the zeal to carry this ‘load’ of managing affairs of Cricket in Greater Accra.
He cautioned the Executive not to exist as ceremonial leaders but to work selflessly as a team to help achieve the key aim of GACA which is to make Cricket the “Game of Accra”.