Corruption in cricket (or "kirkit" as my chronically South Asian mum calls it) has become a joke. South Asians are used to corruption. It's an everyday thing in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. It never happens in Australia. Just ask the Australian Wheat Board. Or the Queensland Police.
Malcolm Conn uses a column in The Australian to remind us all of just how corrupt everyone is in Africa and Asia.
Cricket is widely regarded as a microcosm of the country where it is played, which offers an instant insight into why Pakistani cricket in particular and the ICC in general is such a basket case ...
The Afro-Asia bloc, which brought down the process, has South Africa coming in at 55 on the corruption index while India is ranked 84, Sri Lanka 97, both Pakistan and Bangladesh on 139 and Zimbabwe 146.
He argues that these countries all opposed John Howard's potential presidency to the ICC. A Howard Presidency, just like the Howard Prime Ministership, would never have tolerated corruption. It would never have whitewashed or made excuses for the corrupt. It would have kept a huge distance from itself and corruption.
Conn is right. Just ask the Australian Wheat Board.
UPDATE I: Australian wickie legend Ian Healy claims there was no fixing by the Pakistani wickie at the Sydney Test in January.
UPDATE II: Fairfax websites reproduce an interesting article from the UK Daily Telegraph in which the author makes these enlightening observations:
Pakistan's dressing room is unusual. The first language is not English and Muslim prayers are said and Ramadan, as now, observed.
Gee, that's strange. They don't speak English in the Pakistani dressing room. I wonder why. Could it be because Pakistan is a non-English speaking country? And what is so unusual about Muslim prayers? Last time I checked, the country was called the "Islamic Republic of Pakistan". Yes, the corruption isn't terribly Islamic. But to make a link between corruption on the one hand and prayers and linguistic choices on the other is ridiculous.
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