Sapna Budhrani Holds Over as NICH President
Sapna Budhrani
A change at the top of NICH went under the radar, but tonight we can confirm that there is a new acting president of the statutory body. For the past two years, since former President Diane Haylock took up the appointment as Belize’s Ambassador to Taiwan, Director of the Institute of Creative Arts, Gregory Vernon held over as interim president. But at the end of March Vernon was unceremoniously sent back to his original job as ICA’s Director to make room for the recently hired NICH administrator Sapna Budhrani, who also takes up the post on an interim basis. So why wasn’t a permanent president appointed? Word to News Five is that Budhrani is politically connected and will be wearing multiple hats in the organization—namely administrator, acting president and Chair of the Board of Directors of NICH. Today, C.E.O. in the ministry, Adele Catzim-Sanchez said that Budhrani comes with a wealth of knowledge in finance.
Adele Catzim-Sanchez
Adele Catzim-Sanchez, C.E.O., Ministry of Youth, Sports & Culture
“We have Miss Sapna Budhrani who is now holding over as the acting president of NICH and she is also operating as the administrator of the organization. But what we are doing is we are amending the NICH legislation, the NICH Act so that we can have a different structure for the governance of the organization. So what we want to do is align the governance structure more with what is in place for other statutory bodies. So instead of having a president, we are advocating to have a chair of the board that is separate from the executive director of the organization so that there is a check and balance between the management of the organization and the governance in the board of directors. Currently the president of NICH is also the chair of the NICH board and that person is also sort of the Chief Executive Officer of NICH and so it is having two roles being played by one of the same person. And so what we are trying to do is just make sure that there is that check and balance and to make sure that there is that alignment with what has worked in other organizations.”
Duane Moody
“So Mister Greg, what happened to him?”
Gregory Vernon
Adele Catzim-Sanchez
“Mister Vernon is the Director of ICA; he continues to be the Director of ICA. He’s very good in the creative sector, in the creative industries and he has brought NICH a long way in the last two years and so now we are building on that foundation that has been set. And so now we are building on that foundation that has been set and we are going the next level. So currently the big thing for us is the change in legislation.”
Duane Moody
“In terms of Miss Budhrani, how was she chosen to replace Mister Vernon as acting president?”
Adele Catzim-Sanchez
“Miss Budhrani came in highly qualified because she had over thirteen years experience in the finance sector and also had some experience in the creative industry. And so because of the direction that NICH is taking at this time in building the industry, she had come in initially as the administrator and now functioning in both roles until such time that we have a change or appointment.”
