Just not cricket
IN HIS preamble to the findings on Cricket SA, Judge Nicholson quotes Lord Harris, who wrote that cricket “is more free from anything sordid, anything dishonourable, than any game in the world”. Unfortunately the judge then goes on to find that Lord Harris’s version of the sport does not seem to apply in SA.
The judge’s inquiry, released last week, confirmed a myriad deceptions that continued even after KPMG initially exposed the sordid and dishonourable dealings from cricket chief Gerald Majola and others, which have recently blighted Cricket SA’S reputation.
Judge Nicholson concludes that, as well as irregular payments and bonuses that contravene a raft of regulations, the Cricket SA board actively tried to avoid the consequences of an open and independent inquiry by establishing the internal Khan Commission.
In short, Nicholson concluded that the board did all it could to “minimise the fallout for Majola” by going directly against the wishes of their auditors.
As a section 21 company, Cricket SA is bound to use its funds solely for the promotion of its primary goal, which is broadly the promotion and development of cricket.
In return it is exempt from taxes. That gives the public the right to know how it is spending money and makes it imperative that Cricket SA deal in a transparent manner.
Among other recommendations, Judge Nicholson advocates that the board is restructured along the lines of the trimmed down Australian and New Zealand cricket boards, with “independent, professionally skilled, non-executive directors”; that a further disciplinary inquiry should go as far back as Cricket SA records allow; Majola is suspended and subjected to a Cricket SA disciplinary inquiry as well as criminal investigation; and attention is given to grass-roots development of cricket in SA.
We suggest, that in light of the drawn out, sordid maladministration, the provincial unions do everything they can to follow Judge Nicholson’s recommendations and return cricket to the utopian vision as put forward by Lord Harris.