International Cricket Council (ICC) president Percy Sonn died on Sunday morning at the Durbanville Medi-Clinic in Cape Town.
Sonn (57), a former president of the then United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA), developed complications after he was admitted to hospital to undergo routine colon surgery on Monday. He had been in intensive care throughout the week.
Cricket South Africa (CSA) chief executive Gerald Majola expressed his deep sorrow at the death of Sonn.
”Percy Sonn will be mourned throughout the cricketing world as one of the best administrators the game has known,” said Majola. ”He was one of the pioneers of non-racial cricket in South Africa, and was an administrator at the highest level for more than four decades.
”It was a great tribute for South African and world cricket that he was able to rise from playing as a youngster in the dusty streets of the townships to the highest office in world cricket.
”Percy Sonn fought apartheid both as a cricketer and a civil rights lawyer with vigour and great courage. He was equally energetic and effective in bringing about cricket unity in South Africa with the formation of the UCBSA in 1991 after more than 100 years of division on racial lines.”
Sonn succeeded Ehsan Mani as head of the ICC in June last year. His appointment followed two years as the organisation’s vice-president.
He served as vice-president on the South African Cricket Board and was president of the new United Cricket Board of South Africa for three years until 2003.
Sonn qualified as a lawyer in 1972 and began his career as an administrator during the apartheid era. He played a major role in the formation of a democratic South Africa, and was a founder leader of the Scorpions in the fight against crime.
”He brought to the ICC both as vice-president and president the whole South African cricket experience, which has become a vital element in the globalisation of the game. He played a major role in assisting emerging cricket nations, and history will record the vital part he has played in the emergence of Africa as a major cricketing continent,” said Majola.
”On a personal level, he was my mentor as CEO of Cricket South Africa and I will miss him greatly, as will all cricket structures in South African and world cricket,” he concluded. — Sapa, Reuters