Caulfield rebel John Kanga has won a legal fight to postpone a Melbourne Racing Club disciplinary hearing and will be free to nominate to become the club’s new chairman.
Kanga and fellow board members Caitrin Kelly and Alison Saville applied for a Supreme Court injunction after fearing they were being hauled before an MRC disciplinary committee on Thursday as part of a strategy to suspend them for allegedly breaching the club’s code of conduct.
Melbourne Racing Club board member John Kanga.
As a result, the MRC has agreed to their demands to defer the hearing until next month, allowing all three to attend Thursday night’s annual general meeting.
They will now be free to vote for new office bearers at a board meeting on Friday. Kanga, who joined the MRC executive committee less than two years ago, will nominate for the chairman’s role.
Two new committee members will be announced at the AGM, filling vacancies left by retiring chairman Matt Cain and board member Mark Pratt, who walked away last week.
Kanga has been critical of the MRC’s recent $160 million upgrades at Caulfield Racecourse, while Kelly and Saville accused the MRC board of having a “longstanding poor culture and toxic atmosphere” as well as previous instances of bullying. The MRC denied the allegations.
Kanga filed a motion last month to spill six members of the board at a special general meeting, calling for Caulfield’s new mounting yard to be moved, scrapping plans to build a $250 million grandstand at Caulfield and retaining racing at Sandown Racecourse.
But the MRC ruled out holding an SGM, saying Kanga’s motion was not “legally valid”.
In a statement released on Thursday morning Kanga accused the MRC board of being “tone-deaf and in denial about the reality that the MRC members want them gone”.
“They have wasted hundreds of thousands of the club’s money trying to prevent members voting on removing them at the special general meeting we requisitioned and have been seen to be using desperate tactics to keep their positions,” Kanga said.
“Going forward, if the new board members vote with us and support me as chairman, we can then stop the delay of the special general meeting and move to remove the remaining board members that the MRC members want gone.
“If there are any shenanigans, I will have no hesitation in taking Supreme Court action and am confident we will again prevail.”
The MRC had originally told Kanga, Saville and Kelly on the weekend that they were expected to front a disciplinary committee on Thursday.
“The committee is concerned that a series of actions from three executive committee members may have breached the code of conduct,” a spokesperson for the MRC Nomination, Remuneration and Governance Sub-Committee said.
Cain, who will chair the AGM before stepping down, claimed Kanga’s push for an SGM was an attempt to take control of the club.
In a letter to members earlier this month, Cain said Kanga was using three controversial issues as a way of pushing MRC members to vote for a rule change that will “put all power in his hands and those who back him”.
The MRC and Cain have been contacted for comment.
Kah’s Caulfield bonus
Star jockey Jamie Kah has been given the chance to become the first woman to ride a Caulfield Cup winner this year after the Victorian Racing Tribunal agreed to change the start date of her three-week suspension.
Kah was suspended by the Victorian Racing Tribunal for failing to give her horse, Let’sfacethemusic, every chance to win or run a place in the McNeil Stakes at Caulfield on August 31.
The suspension was to start at midnight this Saturday and continue on until Sunday, October 20, ruling her out of the running of this year’s Caulfield Cup.
But Kah successfully applied to the tribunal to bring the start date of her suspension forward by a day.
She will ride Blue Diamond winner Hayasugi in the Manikato Stakes at Moonee Valley on Friday night and then start her time on the sidelines at midnight.
She then will be free to resume riding in the Caulfield Cup on Saturday, October 19.
Kah will not be expected to lock in a ride for the group 1 event until closer to the race date.
While Michelle Payne became the first woman to ride the winner of the Melbourne Cup, a female jockey is yet to salute in the Caulfield Cup.
