Ken Borland

Graeme Smith, Mark Boucher and Enoch Nkwe are all in place for the next two years so the Proteas will at least enjoy some stability after the turmoil they have been through over the last couple of years, but there is still reason to fear that Cricket South Africa could still be captured.

Smith was on Friday confirmed as the full-time Director of Cricket through until April 2022, which should take care of all the on-field issues as he has already struck up a good working relationship with Proteas head coach Boucher and assistant Nkwe, as well as with the South African Cricketers Association and the players.

But it is in the boardroom, where all the vital decisions are made, where tremendous uncertainty still exists. Most notably because acting chief executive Jacques Faul is not a permanent appointment.

At the moment his contract runs through to June, and there have apparently been moves to give him a three-month extension. But the board, who appoint the CEO, have their hands tied legally because of the elephant still in the room – Thabang Moroe.

The former CEO was suspended on December 6 for misconduct and a permanent chief executive cannot be appointed until Moroe’s disciplinary process has been completed. The forensic audit that is so crucial to that process apparently only began a week or two before Lockdown i.e. in early March, four months after he was suspended!

The audit itself has been allocated three months so justice is most certainly going to be delayed for Mr Moroe. Not that he is probably too concerned because he is on full pay in the interim!

Given that the CSA board still comprises largely the same incompetents who firstly appointed Moroe and then enabled his malfeasance, plus the certainty that the former CEO knows exactly where the board members have buried their own skeletons, there is reasonable anxiety that Faul may yet be told “Thank you very much for fixing our mess” and shown the door.

There has also been talk among those who keep an eye on cricket politics that Moroe has offered to go, no-contest, if he is paid R25 million. If that happens it should really set the cat among the pigeons because it will be seen as rewarding poor governance, will surely further alienate the stakeholders Faul has worked so hard to woo back into the fold and will merely add to the money splurged on Moroe, who has shown an appetite for siphoning up gravy like an elephant with its trunk in a desert waterhole.

Not only is the concept of accountability totally foreign to the current CSA Board, but they are also operating with only eight of the prescribed 12 directors in place. After the spate of resignations at the end of 2019, only two independent directors (Professor Steve Cornelius and Marius Schoeman) remain, and of the six non-independents, five of them have been supporters of Moroe.

And the lead director, who needs to come from the independents, also has not been appointed for two years.

There was a time when Ghanaian-born Naasei Appiah was Moroe’s right-hand man at CSA, rising to the rank of chief operations manager. But Appiah was one of the staff suspended by Moroe last December before his own fall from grace. Appiah’s disciplinary process has also not yet been completed, with commercial manager Clive Eksteen also in the same state of limbo.

It seems Moroe’s other chief ally was company secretary and head of legal Welsh Gwaza. Things like disciplinary hearings and the appointment of new directors fall under his ambit.

So it is surely in the national interest for Gwaza to be asked “Why the delay”?

Unfortunately, CSA’s head of communication, Thami Mthembu, did not reply to a request on Friday to ease the perception many South African cricket fans have that certain people are being protected from accountability.

Amidst these tumultuous times in South African cricket it does seem like acting chief executive Jacques Faul and interim director of cricket Graeme Smith have brought some stability, but it is vital that fans and stakeholders of the game in this country do not forget the reasons for the crisis that led to their appointments and the clarion call for the Cricket South Africa board to stand down must still ring out loud and clear.

There is the danger that because of the sterling work done by Faul and Smith, people think everything is suddenly hunky dory with South African cricket. The battle against the Covid-19 pandemic has also provided a timely distraction for the incompetent, self-serving board to hide behind.

But an expected loss of a billion rand and the poor governance and thoroughly undemocratic behaviour of people like suspended CEO Thabang Moroe and president Chris Nenzani happened on the board’s watch. Many of them were active participants and supporters of #CricketCapture, the rest turned a blind eye and were in breach of their fiduciary duties as directors.

So far, the board has shown no intention of accepting accountability for their gross dereliction of duty to the game.

The big problem in South African cricket, however, is that the governance structure is all wrong and that makes getting rid of the parasites on the board a tough task.

The problem dates back to 2013 and CSA’s reaction to the Gerald Majola Bonus Scandal and the Nicholson Commission’s findings which eventually forced the board to get rid of the then chief executive. But CSA did not follow the commission’s recommendation that independent directors make up the majority on the board. Instead, CSA implemented a new system where five independent directors were elected on to the board alongside seven non-independent directors.

Those seven non-independent directors also sit on the Members Council, a 14-member group that elects the board and, according to CSA’s Memorandum of Incorporation, is the only structure that can dissolve the board.

The seven non-independents are elected from the 12 provincial presidents and CSA also devised a system whereby provincial presidents sit on the Members Council for three years, and can also serve a second three-year term.

So you can see the problem?

With the resignation of Gauteng’s Jack Madiseng as a director, six of the seven non-independent board members also sit on the Members Council that will vote on their fate. So it means at least seven provincial presidents have to vote against them.

But many of those provincial presidents have been part of the problem because they sit on the Members Council for three years. The old saying of turkeys voting for Christmas springs to mind.

A quick survey of the 12 provinces suggests four that would probably vote for change – Gauteng (Madiseng) and KwaZulu-Natal (Ben Dladla) apparently have their mandates already, North-West are currently under the administration of Archie Pretorius, one of Majola’s critics who was kicked off the board during the 2013 sham, and Western Province, who have a new president in Nic Kock, an advocate who has not been scared to take on CSA already in his short term in charge at Newlands.

But Eastern Province are led by a massive supporter of the Moroe/Nenzani axis in Donovan May, Boland have also been a backer through their president, Angelo Carolissen, although his second three-year term should be coming to an end soon. Border have a new president in Simphiwe Ndzundzu but sympathy for Nenzani would be understandable because he comes from the Bisho area.

South-Western Districts also have a long-serving president in Rudi Claassen, as do Free State (Zola Thamae, one of the directors) and Northern Cape (Rihan Richards). Northerns seem unsure of how to vote, mostly because their president, Tebogo Siko, has been newly elected on to the board and should not be blamed for the crisis. Easterns also have a new, young president in Xolani Peter Vonya.

Nenzani and his vice-president Beresford Williams, who has also strongly supported the regime, also have votes on the Members Council.

So because clubs wanting change in some provinces still have to wait two more years before they can outvote their president, change will be slow in coming via the traditional route.

Which is why I would call on any angel investors looking to get involved with Cricket South Africa to stipulate in their contracts that their sponsorships are dependent on the board changing.

And companies like Momentum need to follow through on their earlier ultimatums that they will withdraw their support unless the CSA board resign.

What will hopefully become a new era in South African cricket administration also desperately needs a change in governance structure so we don’t get into this sort of mess again. They had a chance in 2013 to get it right, hopefully in 2020 that chance will be taken and not dropped like a sitter at mid-off.

https://citizen.co.za/sport/sport-columnists/2265248/cricket-south-africa-clean-up-should-extend-to-the-board/

 

Whoever the new coach of the Standard Bank Proteas will be, the team’s biggest need at present is for stability after all the disruptions of the England tour that ended with South Africa being heavily beaten in four days in the fourth and final Test, losing the rubber 3-1, their first series loss in England since 1998 and their heaviest defeat since losing 3-0 to Colin Cowdrey’s team in 1960.

The frontrunner to replace Russell Domingo, judging by media reports, is Ottis Gibson, the current England bowling coach and the former West Indies head coach who won the World T20 in 2012. The 48-year-old Barbadian has both the international experience – having been involved at that level for 11 years – and the local knowledge, having played in South Africa for the better part of the 1990s for Border, Griqualand West and Gauteng.

The list of disruptions the Proteas suffered on their tour of England, with the Tests following their defeats in both limited-overs series and the disappointment of an early exit in the Champions Trophy, starts with Domingo. The coach was not only in the awkward position of not knowing whether the tour would be his last in charge, but then had the awful heartbreak of his mother being involved in a car accident and eventually tragically passing away, forcing Domingo to leave the squad on two occasions and fly back home.

The Proteas were not only without their coach but they also went into the series without their galvanising skipper Faf du Plessis, who missed the first Test at Lord’s having stayed in South Africa for the difficult birth of his first child; a hard call but a totally understandable one.

Du Plessis returned for the second Test at Trent Bridge, with the Proteas winning by a whopping 340 runs. But they were brought back down to earth, hitting the ground hard, in the last two Tests, losing by 239 and 177 runs respectively.

The combination of Vernon Philander and Chris Morris as bowling all-rounders worked a treat in the second Test, but not in the third as Philander suffered an untimely, debilitating illness having made the ball talk in spectacular fashion as he did great work on the first day at the Oval.

The stalwart of the attack then pulled out of the fourth Test with a sore back, prompting Du Plessis to snipe that Philander needed to work harder on his fitness.

The captain shows refreshing candour in press conferences and he basically also confirmed that AB de Villiers’ Test career is dead and the team need to move on as quickly as possible.

At the moment it seems as though they have been left hanging by De Villiers, with three different batsmen being used in the crucial number four spot against England.

For me, Du Plessis should step up, take responsibility and bat in the number four position. He can bat both time and aggressively, and as captain he also needs to set the tone.

Temba Bavuma and Quinton de Kock, as good as they are, are better suited to coming in lower down the order.

Bavuma has the technique and tenacity to be a middle-order fighter much like Jonty Rhodes was, and his value is often worth more than simply the sum of his runs; he should be batting five or six and can also handle the second new ball and marshal the tail.

De Kock has been touted as the new Adam Gilchrist and needs to be used in the same role as the great Australian wicketkeeper/batsman. De Kock has all the shots and likes to use them, and needs to come in at six or seven where he can play his own, counter-attacking game. Having to rebuild at 40 for two does not suit him and he is the sort of batsman who can shift momentum batting lower down or really take the game away from tired bowlers.

Everything depends on a solid start, however, and South Africa had an average opening stand of just 13.62 against England and nothing higher than 21 between Dean Elgar and Heino Kuhn.

Elgar had a good series in tough conditions, scoring a century and two half-centuries as he made the second most runs (291) for the Proteas, behind Hashim Amla (329), but Kuhn’s place must be under serious threat after he made just 113 runs in eight innings.

Stephen Cook, the man Kuhn replaced, must still be in the mix judging by his century last weekend for the SA A side, while those who believe players of the future must be given as much opportunity as possible will be clamouring for Aiden Markram to make his Test debut against Bangladesh at the end of next month.

But whatever the final selection, there must be far more stability over the coaching situation – who Gibson’s assistants will be is shaping as an interesting discussion – and the captaincy. Surely everyone would feel a lot more settled if Du Plessis was just given the captaincy for all three formats?

The selectors and management also need to make up their minds about batting positions and stick to them, players floating up and down the order is doing nobody any good.

A couple of Tests against Bangladesh should be a good opportunity for the Proteas to regather their balance and get back on the winning trail.

There will be the distraction of the Global T20 League after that, but the South Africans need to get quickly back up to speed because world number one India and Australia, itching for revenge, will be considerable opposition when they arrive on these shores later in the summer.