Tape wrangle thwarts commission

The cross-examination of Hansie Cronje ground to a halt at the King commission on Thursday, tangled up in the tape recordings, which first broke the match-fixing scandal in April, but which have not been made available to the South African inquiry.

For the first time during the King commission hearings the tapes, still in the possession of the Delhi police, played a part. Or rather didn't. The absence of either the tapes or certified and authenticated copies led Cronje and his lawyers and the commission's Shamila Batohi into a dispute which had not been resolved when proceedings were adjourned for the day.

Bahoti wanted to question Cronje on the contents of the transcripts, or at least those portions released by the Indian police. And when she produced a copy supplied by Interpol, there were immediate objections from Cronje's legal team.

When she was allowed to proceed, there were further objections after she and Cronje had tussled over the meaning of the word "playing". Batohi wanted Cronje to concede that it could mean "playing along with an agreement", but Cronje insisted that it could just as easily be interpreted as meaning "playing in a match".

In essence, Batohi was playing with one hand tied behind her back because, as Malcolm Wallis for Cronje was quick to point out, the transcripts cannot be accurately dated, have no clear beginning or end and might even, as Cronje suggested, be spliced together from different bits and pieces.

Cronje concedes that he had several conversations with Sanjay Chawla over the phone, but claimed that he was unable to identify which particular conversation the transcript covered. When Batohi said that that the transcripts had been widely published in the media, Cronje interjected: "Is that what I'm being tried on? On what's come out in the media?"

Eventually even Batohi had to concede the great difficulty of attempting to base cross-examination on unauthenticated and incomplete transcripts.

The commission has made a formal application for copies of the tapes through diplomatic channels, but as King ruefully acknowledged: "We may have to wait a long time before we get the evidence."

Cronje and his advisers seem to have a reasonable point. The former captain's indemnity is conditional on full disclosure, but he is clearly unwilling to implicate any of his erstwhile team-mates by speculative answers to questions based on the uncertain grounds of partial transcripts.

Indeed, Cronje also refused to give the names of those senior players involved in the post-meeting meeting in Bombay in 1996. Earlier evidence has been that apart from Cronje, Pat Symcox, Brian McMillan, Dave Richardson and one other were present when Cronje phoned Mukesh Gupta to increase his offer to throw a one-day game from $200 000 to $300 000. The offer was increased to $250 000, but according to Cronje, Symcox and Richardson, it was still refused.

Cronje still seems bound by loyalty to his former comrades, and refused to name names, but King accepted this, saying that they could probably be established by deduction.

There were, in fact, no new admissions by Cronje during his third day on the stand. It appears likely that he has supplied as much information as he is willing or able to at this stage and almost all of it has been corroboration of evidence that had been led before he took the stand.

With reference to Mohammad Azharuddin, for instance, Cronje would say no more than that Azharuddin had introduced him to Gupta on the third day of the Kanpur Test in 1996 before leaving the room. Gupta had initially asked Cronje about buying South African diamonds, before asking Cronje if he could ensure that there were no heroics in the South African second innings. Cronje duly accepted $30 000 from Gupta and South Africa went on to lose, but Cronje insists that he had approached none of his team-mates.

Batohi also delved back into the Centurion Park Test match against England this year, but again Cronje could not be shaken from his initial proposition that while he had accepted a "gift" of R50 000 and a leather jacket from Marlon Aronstam, his declaration had been intended to give South Africa a chance of winning as well as providing an entertaining climax to a game which already seemed dead.

Cronje also pointed out that Daryll Cullinan's decision to retire from one-day cricket had been announced before any decision to save the Test had been made.

It is unclear where Batohi, or the lawyers representing the United Cricket Board, will go from here, but for the first time the commission has stumbled over the problems caused by the unavailability of the Indian tape recordings. The reluctance of the Indian police to release the tapes is understandable. They constitute evidence to be used in criminal charges still to be brought in India. But it is ironic that this should, to a degree anyway, thwart an investigation into similar matters in South Africa.