Cronje inquiry to resume in October

A commission probing corruption in South African cricket is to resume public hearings on 2 October, the commission's secretary, John Bacon, announced yesterday.

A commission probing corruption in South African cricket is to resume public hearings on 2 October, the commission's secretary, John Bacon, announced yesterday.

The probe, headed by the retired Judge, Edwin King, was set up after the national team captain, Hansie Cronje, admitted to taking a single illicit payment from a bookmaker, sparking the country's biggest sporting scandal.

Testifying before the commission last month, Cronje confessed to taking five separate payments totalling about $100,000 (£60,000) from gamblers and bookmakers and said a $20,000 deposit into his account could have been for match information as well. He has denied ever having fixed a match, however.

Bacon said it had not yet been decided whether it was necessary to ask Cronje to appear at the hearing for a second time.

"We haven't determined who all the witnesses will be yet," he said. A first round of hearings was adjourned on 26 June to give King time to write up an interim report for the county's President, Thabo Mbeki, by 11 August.

Bacon did not know how long the second round of hearings would last. "We want to sit until we are finished," he said.

The commission has still not managed to get access to tapes made by the Indian police of conversations Cronje had with bookmakers earlier this year - evidence that sparked the scandal. "We are still battling. We did write another letter and hopefully this time, we followed the correct procedure," Bacon said. "Hopefully this time we will be successful."