King closes match-fixing inquiry

Jeremy Lovell

South Africa's inquiry into cricket match-fixing was brought to an abrupt end on Thursday by the judge heading the commission because of the threat of legal action by disgraced former captain Hansie Cronje.

Judge Edwin King told a news conference that Cronje and former team mates Herschelle Gibbs and Henry Williams were the only South African players implicated in the match-fixing scandal which triggered the inquiry.

"I have now formally approached the President (Thabo Mbeki) to close the commission at my request, subject to the compilation of my final report," King said.

"I have been informed by Shamila Batohi, who has led the evidence at the commission, that there is no evidence implicating any other member of the team, former member of the team, administrator or official," he added.

"I promised at the outset there would be no cover-up and no witch hunt. We have not covered anything up and there has been no witch hunt," King said.

The United Cricket Board accepted the proposed closure of the King commission.

"We accept the judge's reasons for wishing to close the commission," the UCB said in a statement. "We are pleased to note that the commission has cleared all other members and former members of the team (apart from those who have accepted culpability), officials and administrators."

Cronje, who admitted during public hearings in June that he accepted $100,000 from bookmakers to throw matches, had been offered immunity from prosecution if King was satisfied that he had revealed everything to the inquiry.

"At the moment that is something I have to decide upon. It is something that is exercising my mind," King said in reply to a question.

King, who in his second interim report in December recommended making players take lie detector tests and tapping their telephones, said he was unsure when his final report would be ready.

"It is going to take a little time. I am going to invite the legal representatives of the various parties to make written submissions. I expect Cronje's lawyers to do that, and they must be given time," he said.

Cronje was sacked in April after Indian police accused him of being involved in match-fixing. He was banned for life by the UCB in October but is trying to have the ban overturned.

Opener Gibbs and bowler Williams, who had admitted agreeing to throw matches but said they never went through with the deal, were banned from international competition until January.

King's enquiries have been hampered by lack of co-operation from Indian cricket authorities and several legal challenges by Cronje's high-powered legal team.

Work still to be done

The Cape High Court ruled in December against an attempt by King to impose January 24 as the date for hearings to resume.

On February 5, lawyers representing Cronje said they might attempt a challenge to King following a ruling in the Constitutional Court that a judge could not be the head of a Special Investigative Unit.

The Commission immediately cancelled a sitting set for February 19 and said it would seek clarity on the ruling before deciding whether the inquiry would resume.

King said he was confident the challenge was baseless, but that nevertheless he had decided to call it a day.

"The threatened court proceedings would of necessity have occasioned a further delay in the work of the commission," King said.

"Further litigation would have, whatever the result, placed an additional financial burden on the taxpayer."

UCB spokeswoman Bronwyn Wilkinson said the board was hard at work studying the recommendations King had already made.

"There is still some work for us to do as far as the recommendations in his interim report and on governance of the game are concerned," she said by telephone from Johannesburg.

"The fact that there will be no more public hearings does not mean that all the work is over.".

A spokeswoman for sports minister Ngconde Balfour, who has had regularly to rebuff speculation that he wanted the inquiry to be terminated, was equally tactful.

"The minister accepts what the judge has decided," spokesman Graham Abrahams told Reuters. "He is satisfied that the judge has delivered on the mandate delivered to him by the President."

Mail Cricket Editor