SA Rugby postpones equity deal meeting at government request

SA Rugby has agreed to postponeits special general council meeting over a proposed equity deal with US-based Ackerley Sports Group (ASG).

The special general meeting was scheduled to take place in Cape Town on Thursday, where SARU and its 14 provincial unions were to determine whether ASG would be allowed to acquire a 20 percent stake in SA Rugby's commercial arm for an outlay of R1.3 billion ($75 million).

READ | SA Rugby's controversial equity deal rocked: Uncertainty hovers over Thursday's key vote

However, sports minister Gayton McKenzie wrote an open letter to SA Rugby president Mark Alexander in which he called for the postponement of the meeting.

On Wednesday afternoon, SA Rugby agreed to McKenzie's request. 

The rugby governing body said the meeting will be rescheduled at the minister's request "to more fully brief government on the proposal".

"We received the request from the minister this morning and we are happy to oblige, having shared the request with our member union presidents," said Alexander.

"We had previously briefed him on his appointment, but we understand his request for further assurance considering the newsworthiness of this proposal."

In his open letter, McKenzie wrote: "Dear President Alexander, I trust you and your team are well amid the enormous interest and scrutiny that is currently being brought to bear on the pending commercial decisions at SARU.

"Let me start off by thanking you for our previous engagements and your assurance to me that the stake in the SARU Commercial Rights Company to Ackerley Sports Group will not exclude South Africans, and that indeed the deal has South Africans in it.

"I also appreciate your assurances that this deal is, in effect, not the sale of an important South