Mukuhlani claims he was victim of a plot

Officially, Mukuhlani said that he stepped down for personal reasons unconnected with cricket, but he then told the paper that "power-hungry individuals who will blow in any direction" had destabilised operations in the country's largest province.

"There is a lot of politics in the province. At some point, you feel that you need to move on and contribute in some other way," he said. "I had a long discussion with the Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) chairman [Peter Chingoka] and at the end he accepted that I was doing the right thing."

According to Mukuhlani, the controversial AGM in Bulwayo last month, where he tried to introduce a proposal that ZC officials should not hold conflicting posts, resulted in a plot to remove him. "At the AGM, I spoke strongly against dual roles in ZC. There must be a clear demarcation line between different active roles so that we do not compromise the careers of the players. What is there now is that there are no checks and balances. We have a case where the policy makers are the policy implementers, which means we have people being answerable to themselves. I do not believe in this. This is not a personal issue, but I felt that is not the correct thing to be done."

Mukuhlani suggested that Macsood Ebrahim, who lost his position as head of the selection panel at the AGM, and others were allegedly instigating the problems in the province. "Clear factions have come out with sinister agendas. They know that if they destabilise Mashonaland, everything will fall. If there is no cricket in Mashonaland then there won't be cricket in Zimbabwe. The honest truth is that the clubs are fighting someone's war."

Ebrahim strenuously denied that he had anything to do with any plot. "These are Mashonaland internal issues and where do I get involved involved?" Ebrahim said. "I am the chairman of Masvingo. Mashonaland has been having upheavals for eight months and they have to look at themselves and stop blaming other people. The bottom line is that there are problems in Mashonaland, but we concentrate on cricket. We must not lose it on the bigger picture."

There are widespread rumours that a behind-the-scenes power struggle is underway, with two factions battling for effective control of the board. Mukuhlani's comments would seem to give more substance to those suggestions.