Cronje under fire for bank accounts

Fakir Hassen

Indemnity from prosecution for disgraced former South Africa cricket captain Hansie Cronje, banned for life for his involvement in match-fixing, is in doubt again.

Allegations are rife that more than 10 million rands had been deposited into 19 different bank accounts in his name.

The new claims came just as Cronje was winning strong public support in his bid to have the ban lifted by the United Cricket Board of South Africa.

They have also put a damper on calls that a reconciliation meeting between the parties involved, rather than the high court action initiated by Cronje's legal team, would be in the best interests of the sport.

The Sunday Telegraph of London said that more than 10.5 million rands worth of undisclosed deposits were made into bank accounts in Cronje's name between 1995 and 2000, when he captained the national side.

This was way in excess of the earnings he would have received, even with bonuses and allowances. The Sunday Telegraph also said that Cronje owned eight properties.

By his own admission earlier, Cronje said he had done no other work since leaving school except playing the sport he loved.

At the King Commission hearings in June last year, Cronje said he had received only $120,000 from international bookmakers in four payments, and a further 53,000 rands from South African bookmaker Marlon Aronstam for information about match conditions.

The South African government established the commission after Cronje confessed to his involvement with bookmakers following the release by Indian police of telephonic conversations between Cronje and an Indian bookmaker.

Although the commission has since ended its work, it did not make the decisive recommendation that would have secured indemnity from prosecution for Cronje.

He had been promised this indemnity if he came clean at the commission, but Judge Edwin King, chairman of the commission, said he could not say this with certainty.

Although the commission did not refer to the huge deposits into Cronje's accounts, the Sunday Telegraph said it had seen copies of confidential reports of a forensic team employed by the commission.

"The details of the avalanche of cash into Cronje's spider web of accounts were uncovered by a team of forensic auditors employed by the King Commission to probe the disgraced cricketers' financial affairs," the paper said.

It said the team could not identify immediately the source of almost 120 payments into the accounts.

The new reports have dampened hopes that a proposed meeting later this week between Cronje and his team and the National Directorate of Public Prosecutions would result in him securing the indemnity, which now has to be decided by the Director of Public Prosecutions, Bulelani Ngquka.

The new revelation of bank accounts also holds serious implications for Cronje in terms of laws relating to taxation and foreign currency exchange regulations.

He is already facing possible prosecution under these laws following his disclosures at the King Commission that he had kept cash dollars received from bookmakers in his home without even counting them. If the new allegations are proven, they could aggravate these cases.

Indo-Asian News Service