Usmani, Palani, Rudie among 5 in fray for Associate Directors election

Five candidates, including three incumbents, are in the running for the Associate Members' Director positions on the ICC Board. The election will be held during the ICC Annual Conference in Edinburgh next month.

The candidates are Mubashir Usmani (UAE), Mahinda Vallipuram (Malaysia), Gurumurthy Palani (France), Dr Rudie van Vuuren (Namibia), and Imran Khwaja (Singapore) — the deputy chair of the ICC. Neil Speight (Bermuda) and Sankar Renganathan (Sierra Leone) were expected to enter the race, but only five candidates made the June 7 nomination deadline.

Usmani, Vallipuram, and Khwaja are sitting ICC directors, while Palani currently represents Associate Members on the ICC Chief Executives' Committee (CEC). Forty-three Associate Members will elect three directors for a two-year term on the ICC Board. Voting and counting take place on July 8.

With Associate nations performing well in recent ICC tournaments (especially the T20 World Cup), development of the game among these countries has gained attention, adding significance to this election. Notably, the USA and Canada cannot vote as their boards remain suspended.

All 43 Associate Members have three votes each, totaling 129 votes. Based on previous elections, a candidate will likely need more than 20 votes to win. Last time, Vallipuram won with fewer votes but there were 11 candidates; this time there are only five.

A key factor is how votes are cast across regions. Of the five candidates, three are from Asia, one from Africa, and one from Europe. It remains to be seen whether the election results in broader geographical representation, as all current Associate directors are from Asia.

Breakdown of eligible 43 Associate voting nations by region:

• America (2): Brazil, Costa Rica
• Europe (10): Netherlands, Scotland, Spain, Germany, Denmark, Jersey, France, Italy, Sweden, Romania
• Africa (11): Namibia, Mozambique, Tanzania, Malawi, Kenya, Botswana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Uganda, Seychelles
• East Asia Pacific (6): Indonesia, Japan, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, Samoa, Philippines
• Asia (14): UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, Hong Kong, Nepal, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Myanmar, Bhutan, Maldives