ICC finally acts, but is it enough?

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The International Cricket Council’s move on Friday to suspend Pakistan’s Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir under its anti-corruption code comes at the end of a turbulent decade that has seen the governing body playing catch-up with shady characters and gullible players, when it should have been rounding up culprits and weeding out corruption.

Ever since late South Africa captain Hansie Cronje, with his shocking revelations into the ugly side of the game forced the ICC to set up an anti-corruption unit in 2000, all subsequent leads have been lost either due to inaction or for lack of solid evidence.
Take the case of Pakistan’s unexpected loss in the Sydney Test this past Australian summer which led the ICC’s then-Anti Corruption and Security Unit chief Paul Condon to assert that the result had “deeply worried” the governing body.
But the ACSU instead of investigating the matter itself, choose to rely on the Pakistan Cricket Board’s enquiry.
And while the PCB banned its players, some of them indefinitely, the ICC gave a clean chit to the same group, saying there was no clear evidence.
In his report to the ICC, Condon said: “It was a flurry of allegations, but investigations at the time suggested that it was more about a dysfunctional team, rather than match-fixing.”
The bookie Mazhar Majeed, caught in the sting investigation by a British tabloid, however, allegedly said that Sydney was the last instance where he was involved in fixing a match.
“Let me tell you the last Test we did. It was the second Test against Australia in Sydney,” he said. “Australia had two more wickets left. They had a lead of 10 runs, yeah. And Pakistan had all their wickets remaining. The odds for Pakistan to lose that match, for Australia to win that match, were I think 40 to 1.”
In fact, the only player to be banned by the ICC — Marlon Samuels — for passing on information to an Indian bookmaker during ODI series was due to an investigation by the Indian police, and was based on the judgement of a West Indies Cricket Board disciplinary committee hearing.
Just before the Lord’s Test too, Pakistan newspaper Jang had reported the presence of Mazhar and Tariq Majeed in the Pakistan dressing room, mingling with the players while posing as their agents. But the ICC chose to ignore the report, even though, as it later turned out, Mazhar was on the ACSU watch-list.
The last decade’s history is awash with similar instances in international cricket, and now with the the rise of T20 leagues, an early and swift end to match-fixing menace doesn’t look like ending anytime soon.
The ICC’s action on Friday was long overdue, but according to its corruption code, revamped in October last year, it only has a small window to put together a strong case and an independent tribunal consisting of representatives from all member nations except Pakistan.
The provisional suspension only lasts three months, after which Pakistan skipper Butt and the two pacers Amir and Asif will be let off, unless the ICC can prove otherwise.
The greatest challenge for the ICC might come from the PCB itself, which has tied itself into knots over this latest embarrassment. Hours before the ICC’s decision, the PCB claimed that the trio had opted out of the ODI series and were not suspended.
Thereafter, it emerged that the ICC had taken the call without informing the PCB, even though the ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat maintained he had informed PCB chief Ejaz Butt.
The PCB’s stance puts Asif’s ex-girlfriend Veena Malik’s claim that all players and the PCB officialdom, from top to bottom, are involved in the match-fixing, into the spotlight.
The ICC, in the course of the next few weeks, may find out to their surprise that lack of time is the least of their worries.