African talent withers under a corrupt sun

Written by Jeff Delaney
Wednesday, 05 October 2011 15:27

Multiple Olympic gold winner runner Emil Zátopek is credited with saying: “A runner must run with dreams in his heart, not money in his pocket.” A noble sentiment, but how naïve it sounds today as the sporting world reels from one cash-fuelled crisis to another.

Chicanery, it appears, has replaced chivalry in the code of modern competition as the cancer of corruption spreads inexorably across the globe showing scant respect for creed or colour.

In Africa, news that the continent would host football’s 2010 FIFA World Cup was greeted with joy at home and not a little sour scepticism abroad. History will show the optimists had it right. The tournament was a spectacular success, with one caveat – the dismal showing of African teams.

While apologists point to the long established professionalism and/or wealth of “international” leagues and bemoan the lack of commitment of foreign-based players, the evidence points elsewhere.

Indeed, a damning report by the Forum of African Investigative Reporters (Fair) puts the blame squarely on the shoulders of corrupt and inefficient administrators. “…while players have sacrificed their personal fortunes to develop not just soccer but their own communities, and have in some cases bailed out their national teams, the administrators tasked with developing the game focus on personal gain,” the organisation says.

It’s a more than fair observation. In South Africa, a shortage of cash is certainly not a problem – the country’s premier league is one of the best-funded in the world. Despite this wealth, Bafana Bafana achieved the dubious distinction of being the first host team to be eliminated in the first round of the competition.

Cashing in

Fair reports that far from indulging in some much-needed introspection, however, the local organising committee voted to allocate 10 percent of the 2010 FIFA World Cup profits (estimated at US$130 million) to its own members and five percent (US$65 million) to local football officials.

South African officials are not alone in their greed, however. Fair claims that large amounts of sponsorship cash generated in Cameroon, Nigeria, Kenya, Ivory Coast and even Zimbabwe, rarely trickle down to aid development.

Solutions to the problem will, however, remain elusive until world governing body FIFA (which scored a massive US$3,2 billion from the 2010 World Cup) gets proactive.

That seems unlikely; FIFA has shown a red card virtually every time African countries have attempted to address corruption in their soccer associations. The governing body follows a strict policy of suspending countries where governments dare meddle.

On the surface this sounds great, but in reality, according to Fair, it only serves to entrench maladministration.

It must be stated that soccer skulduggery is not confined to Africa. The Italian Serie A has been wracked by regular scandals as have the Greek, Turkish, French and, well, just about any league you might think of.

Indeed, even FIFA continues to battle allegations of corruption at the highest level and, until it gets its house in order, the future remains bleak.

Athletes crippled

Maladministration is, sadly, not limited to football. The deplorable furore generated by the gender debate centred on South African athlete Caster Semenya had one positive outcome – it focused attention on widespread malfeasance and incompetence at Athletics South Africa (ASA).

The resulting publicity led to a South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc) investigation that found ASA supremo Leonard Chuene and two board members, Kakata Maponyane and Dr Simon Dlamini, guilty of dishonesty, fraud and misconduct.

Sascoc found there was “rampant abuse of ASA resources, an abuse of power and authority, self-aggrandisement, greed and corruption”. Chuene was barred from holding any position in athletics or any other code of sport under the jurisdiction of Sascoc for a period of seven years, with the others receiving similar sanctions.

Commenting at the time, Sascoc boss Tubby Reddy said: “It’s what we have promised. All along we have maintained that we are transparent and that we have nothing to hide. We have consistently been respectful of the investigation process, and we are happy that the correct process and procedures have been followed.”

Quite, but the paltry number of medals garnered on the international stage by South African athletes in recent years gives some indication of the damage done. Today ASA has a reconstituted board and there appears, at least on the surface, to be a greater focus on the athletes – that’s a positive indeed.

Gentleman’s game

Unlike football and athletics, administrators of the gentleman’s game of cricket have remained relatively untouched by the whiff of scandal, until recently that is. The game has, however, been forever scarred by a series of match-fixing allegations, none so shocking as those levelled at the self-professed pillar of Christian rectitude, former South African captain Hansie Cronje.

Few will forget the initial indignant denials that followed the 2000 charges by Indian police that Cronje had accepted bribes from a black-listed bookmaker to fix matches.

Sadly, St Hansie’s halo was tarnished as his tearful revelations at a subsequent court of enquiry soon proved. Cronje was banned from all cricket for life, and the fallout from the case soon claimed the careers of Pakistan’s Saleem Malik and India’s Mohammad Azharuddin and Ajay Jadeja.

Pot of deceit

The scandal blew the lid off a pot of deceit that had been simmering for years. Cheating, we discovered, knew no boundaries, as the similar indiscretions of Australia’s Mark Waugh and Shane Warne became common knowledge.

To its credit, the International Cricket Council (ICC) took action, setting up an anti-corruption and security unit, headed by former top Bobbie Paul Condon, that claims to have had considerable success in battling the problem.

Unfortunately, allegations of crooked gambling that surfaced during last year’s tour of England by Pakistan seem to hint that much work remains to be done.

Closer to home, Cricket South Africa (CSA), has been rocked by infighting between administrators, supposed missing monies and allegations that CEO Gerald Majola and a number of executives have benefited from unsanctioned bonuses.

A KPMG forensic audit revealed grave corporate governance issues, yet it appears CSA, after administering a “stern reprimand”, is unwilling to take the matter further.

Transparency

Majola remains unrepentant: “KPMG was called in to carry out a forensic audit of CSA after repeated allegations that some R68 million was missing from the organisation. The audit findings show that no money is missing from CSA.

“Unfortunately now that the forensic audit result has proven as untrue the allegations of missing millions that were published and printed in many newspapers, there is an attempt to deflect attention from these false claims that led to the audit. The audit was never about the amounts paid to the CEO as my remuneration is not secret and is published in CSA’s Annual Report,” he says.

The latter may well be true, but few in the game believe the last over has been bowled in this test of wills.

The huge sums of money associated with modern sport have certainly led to greater excellence on the field. Unfortunately, in many cases the same often doesn’t hold true in the boardrooms inhabited by the power brokers.

There’s a fresh wind of transparency blowing through North African politics today. Let’s hope it filters through to sport. It’s high time.