Crucket

With an appointment with Zimbabwe looming in the touring schedule, I’ve been following events there in the hope that things are improving in the country so that our tour won’t be the moral minefield it was when we last toured in 2005. The recent formation of a unity government has given me hope, but the subsequent arrest of one of the Movement for Democratic Change ministers on terrorism charges indicate that things aren’t going to change that quickly.

The fact is that while Mugabe is in power, Zimbabwe is no place for us to be visiting. The abuse of human rights will continue and democracy will continue to be trampled upon. We should not tour Zimbabwe in July.

Thankfully then, the government is concerned about the impending tour. There may be a chance that they will step in and ensure the tour will not go ahead.

You will recall that we were last scheduled to tour Zimbabwe in 2005. An unholy stink was raised amongst opponents and supporters of the tour. Mike and I had a minor punch-up over it on Mike on Cricket. I think that neither NZC or the government wanted that tour to go ahead, but cancelling the tour without penalties would require the government to legislate to make touring illegal. Essentially, the solution was for the government to block the players’ passports were they to try to leave the country. This was a step too far for the then Labour-led government, and at the time I had to agree that while it was morally objectionable for us to tour Zimbabwe, it would be a violation of the players’ rights to forbid them to travel. Basically, the ICC had set the bar too high for governments to prevent tours.

Since then however, both England and Australia have prevented tours of Zimbabwe in exactly this way. Also, our current National-led government seems to be prepared to play loose with our rights (at least two bills presented by the government have been deemed inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act by the attorney general). There are calls for the government to ensure the tour does not go ahead.

I still think that banning the players from travelling would be the wrong thing to do, but for the right reason. Some believe it would be possible to legislate against the tour without going to such extremes, so who knows, it may be possible to do it the right thing for the right reason. I note however that recently John Key has been trying to suggest that security and health risks are equally important reasons not to go to Zimbabwe. Both of which strike me as spurious – as far as I can tell the only people threatened by violence in Zimbabwe are those targeted by the government, and the players are in no danger from cholera from their bottled water. It sounds a bit like he is trying to find excuses for the tour to be abandoned without a government order. Which would mean that the tour would be abandoned for the wrong reasons.