Focus shifts to King Commission

The inquiry into the match-fixing and betting scandal is going from place to place. The scene has well and truly shifted to the origin of the scandal, so to say. The King commission of inquiry in South Africa commenced hearings into the scam in Cape Town on Wednesday. The Commission has started the process with the aim to cleansing the game of corruption in the country.

South African opening batsman Herschelle Gibbs and spinner Derek Crookes arrived to depose before the King Commission in Cape Town on Thursday. Crookes while deposing, corraborated the earlier statement made by Pat Symcox on Wednesday that the then captain Hansie Cronje had conveyed to the players an offer of 50,000 dollars to lose a one day game in Mumbai in 1996. Crookes revealed that Cronje had said that if the team accepted the offer, no one else should be told, including the players' wives. Crookes said he thought "I was the first to stand up in the meeting but it may have been Andrew (Hudson)" adding "I thought it was immoral, the wrong thing to do and could jeopardise my career."

Gibbs' name appeared in the conversation taped by Delhi police where Cronje was heard telling a bookmaker that Gibbs would make less than 20 runs in an one-day international in Faridabad in March this year. He was out for 19 the next day. Gibbs faces charges of match-fixing from New Delhi police, along with Cronje, Nicky Boje and Pieter Strydom.

On Wednesday, Judge Edwin King opened the proceedings with a warning to all witnesses to give a satisfactory answer or face prosecution if they failed to answer satisfactorily "any question lawfully put to them." The judge said the hearings would be public unless he ruled otherwise for evidence to be produced under camera. "I don't see that happening frequently, or at all," he said.

The South African Sports Minister Ngconde Balfour said "It is a very serious thing that we clean out South African cricket. I have a lot of faith in the inquiry that it is going to do its job properly."

The first witness to give evidence was Neil Andrews. Being actively involved in racing, Andrews explained the intricacies of fixed-odds betting, spread betting, line betting and the many ways people might wager money on sports events. The others who followed suit were Cronje's team mates, former South African off-spinner Pat Symcox, batsman Daryll Cullinan and spinner Derek Crookes.

The second evidence was given by Symcox, who dropped a bombshell. Symcox, who deposed before the commission, said he was approached by Cronje about "throwing" a cricket match against Pakistan during the 1994/95 season. Symcox said "Hansie called me to his room before the Mandela Trophy game against Pakistan in Cape Town and asked me what I thought about an offer he had received to lose the game." He added "I told him (Cronje) I thought it was a bad idea. My advice was not to worry about it and just get on with the game.''

Asked to elaborate on the offer made in Mumbai in 1996, Symcox said "We attended a meeting in Cronje's room in which he put it to us that he had received an offer for the team to lose a match for $250,000." He said the team rejected the initial offer and added "four of us discussed the money afterwards and someone said perhaps we should try and get more out of them. Hansie picked up the phone, spoke to someone and told us we had another $100,000." Symcox added that the sweetened offer was also later rejected.

The former off spinner revealed a third approach, which he said was by a foreign player, whom he described as ``Mr X'', during the 1996 tour which he said had been made to him personally. He turned it down. Symcox, when asked about the offer made by 'Mr X', said he did not want to divulge the name of the foreign player because he was a current international cricketer. "We were booking into a hotel in Mumbai or Delhi and chatted a bit. He asked whether I would be interested in getting involved in some betting. It seemed strange to ask me because at that stage I wasn't sure whether I would be in the team. I turned it down." The commission is scheduled to present interim findings by the end of June.

Meanwhile, Cronje's spiritual adviser Pastor Ray McCaulay on Wednesday admitted that the recorded voice on the tapes with the Delhi Police was indeed that of the sacked former South African cricket captain. McCaulay added Cronje said his intention was to "play with" the bookmakers and never to throw away matches.

In India, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) completed the scrutiny of the 40-hour long secretly recorded interviews with players, administrators and others. The agency which took two days to complete the viewing said it would discuss the future course of action based on the tapes. CBI sources said, "the progress in the case will be reviewed once again and it will now be decided what should be the future course of investigation."

Asked to comment on the admissibility of the tapes, the sources said "it is too early to answer. We will take a legal opinion on it." The tapes are being forwarded to the legal wing of the premier investigating agency for their comment.

On a separate front, former Indian all rounder Manoj Prabhakar who is under a cloud, denied his involvement with the Apace Group of Companies. He was accused by the Madhya Pradesh police of defrauding depositors and a case was registered against Prabhakar and two others. Police said they have seized counterfoils of the fixed deposit receipts allegedly signed by Prabhakar and also a magazine of the company in which he wrote a message to investors in his capacity as director of the firm. Prabhakar though refused to accept the claims saying "I am not aware which message the police are talking about. If the firm owners have used my name why should I be hanged for no fault of mine." He however added "I will say nothing on this allegation," when asked to comment about the counterfoils of fixed deposits.

But whatever happens in India, the focus will continue to be on the King Commission and South Africa. Unless, of course Messrs Kapil Dev and Manoj Prabhakar and Jagmohan Dalmiya and IS Bindra come up with something more sensational than Symcox's revelation.