John Howard to head ICC?

[silentstriker]

None of his political positions should be an issue. They followed their protocol and picked a candidate, as was their right. There really isn't a good argument against his nomination.

Whether it's a good choice or a bad one is irrelevent (and I think it's a good choice) - the choice was Oz/NZ's to make and they made it. There is no point in having this system if you're going to use this type of blocking of candidates.

 

[four_or_six]

Hahahahahahahahah!

So South Africa, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Zimbabwel etc. etc. all hate Australia? And don't want an Australian candidate?

Puh-lease.

Well it's not unreaslistic though that some sides might not care about Howard, but vote with other countries for political reasons. It's not saying Bangladesh hate Australia, for example, just that they know it's better for them to vote with India.

Anyway, both sides have been ridiculously awful in this in one way or the other. Australia should have known that Howard wasn't going to be welcomed and found someone else who was appropriate (you can't tell me that there aren't plenty of other people in Australia who could do this job very well). And the large block voting against them should be pretty ashamed of themselves, they should have rejected the candidate plenty of time ago, with openness and clarity over the reasons for taking such an unprecedented step.

 

[jeevan]

Electoral confirmation of a selected candidate works quite well here in the US, else we'd have Bush's personal lawyer on the supreme court. It's part of the checks & balances in the system, probably why the ICC adopted it too.

Frankly, it seems to have worked. The Aus & NZ botched up the selection process - there was a fine candidate who wanted the job in John Anderson - and foisted a novice with an accomplished but controversial (wrt the voting members) background in another field. System said "No, thank you".

People could've been more polite about it and let CA know ahead of time, I suppose. But those are all back room dealings that we can only speculate on.

 

[GraemeSmith]

Electoral confirmation of a selected candidate works quite well here in the US, else we'd have Bush's personal lawyer on the supreme court. It's part of the checks & balances in the system, probably why the ICC adopted it too.

Frankly, it seems to have worked. The Aus & NZ botched up the selection process - there was a fine candidate who wanted the job in John Anderson - and foisted a novice with an accomplished but controversial (wrt the voting members) background in another field. System said "No, thank you".

People could've been more polite about it and let CA know ahead of time, I suppose. But those are all back room dealings that we can only speculate on.

Exactly! People are acting as if the boards have a god given right to have their candidate approved once they choose him. The system exists for a reason, to prevent crazy candidates from getting power and it worked in this instance. There is no need to get offended over it as CA and some posters here are doing by turning this into a ridiculous paranoid anti-australian conspiracy theory.

 

[DingDong]

they should have let howard become vp just for his looks really. pawar and howard would easily have been the the best looking heads of a sports org of all time.

pawar and howard: bringing the ***y back to cricket

 

[Edged&Taken]

news that the better lookin Mark Taylor could replace Howard as a candidate for ICC VP .

LINK

 

[vic_orthdox]

I think what has riled up the Australians the most is the fact that in the past, it had been fait accompli and accepted convention that everyone accepted the nomination, in spite of any concerns that nations have had about the candidate.

 

[Dissector]

If the Taylor report is true that is good news and I am sure Taylor will be accepted immediately without any problems.

And Jeevan has it right; the ICC vote is as legitimate a part of the system as the nomination. Australia/NZ have the right to nominate who they want and the boards have the right to reject that nomination if they feel it's not suitable. You could have an alternate system where the nomination is automatically selected but that is not the system we have.

 

[Top_Cat]

I think what has riled up the Australians the most is the fact that in the past, it had been fait accompli and accepted convention that everyone accepted the nomination, in spite of any concerns that nations have had about the candidate.

Yeh, watch that dissolve in the future now. Gloves will be off.

And not sure why Taylor would be considered a better candidate, tbh. Unless the ICC has a need for surveying or air conditioners. Actually, the headquarters are in Dubai now aren't they? Might be a shrewd move in the end to get Taylor and Fujitsu on-board.

The really funny thing is, he'll be seen as a friendlier alternative when he's always been a fairly vocal Howard supporter. The ICC might not have picked Howard but they might end up with him anyway by proxy; don't imagine for a second he will hesitate to call upon Howard for advice/back-room dealings and that Howard won't be in his ear at every opportunity.

 

[pasag]

. Unless the ICC has a need for surveying or air conditioners.

 

[Jono]

Tubbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbby!

 

[honestbharani]

Well it's not unreaslistic though that some sides might not care about Howard, but vote with other countries for political reasons. It's not saying Bangladesh hate Australia, for example, just that they know it's better for them to vote with India.

Anyway, both sides have been ridiculously awful in this in one way or the other. Australia should have known that Howard wasn't going to be welcomed and found someone else who was appropriate (you can't tell me that there aren't plenty of other people in Australia who could do this job very well). And the large block voting against them should be pretty ashamed of themselves, they should have rejected the candidate plenty of time ago, with openness and clarity over the reasons for taking such an unprecedented step.

AWTA.. As I have said from the beginning, I have no problem with Howard being rejected when there is so much going against him, but it should have happened a LONG time back and CA/NZC should have been given enough time to come up with someone else.. I mean, it is not like no one knew Howard was going to be their nominee...


And whole bunch of crap by people like Conn, Heigh and Speed about the boards not wanting a guy who will stand up to them as ICC President.. lol.. A load of crap.. Fact has been that quite a few of these guys actually seem to hate the fact that the 7 boards who they always seemed to think was their right to rule over have woken up and are now standing up to them... Talk about irony!!!!!

 

[honestbharani]

I think what has riled up the Australians the most is the fact that in the past, it had been fait accompli and accepted convention that everyone accepted the nomination, in spite of any concerns that nations have had about the candidate.

But were the concerns at the same level with any of the previous candidates?????


And it is total bollocks about Howard standing up to BCCI and others.. He would have been the muppet puppet that every other ICC president is, was and has been... He has basically saved him some embarrasment as far as I am concerned...

 

[honestbharani]

Yeh, watch that dissolve in the future now. Gloves will be off.

And not sure why Taylor would be considered a better candidate, tbh. Unless the ICC has a need for surveying or air conditioners. Actually, the headquarters are in Dubai now aren't they? Might be a shrewd move in the end to get Taylor and Fujitsu on-board.

The really funny thing is, he'll be seen as a friendlier alternative when he's always been a fairly vocal Howard supporter. The ICC might not have picked Howard but they might end up with him anyway by proxy; don't imagine for a second he will hesitate to call upon Howard for advice/back-room dealings and that Howard won't be in his ear at every opportunity.

You know.. It really doesn't matter if he is gonna George W Bush in his ear... The position has no real executive powers...


The max he could do is give out some strong interviews but he might end up looking like an ass even then, like Speed did on more than one occassion, IIRC...

 

[Top_Cat]

You know.. It really doesn't matter if he is gonna George W Bush in his ear... The position has no real executive powers...

Naive in the extreme to believe a position like that and who they know could have no influence, though.

 

[four_or_six]

Fact has been that quite a few of these guys actually seem to hate the fact that the 7 boards who they always seemed to think was their right to rule over have woken up and are now standing up to them... Talk about irony!!!!!

I think that's ridiculous. No-one (as far as I'm aware) currently, including those you mentioned, thinks that Australia, New Zealand and England have the right to rule over the other countries. I wish we could just worry about whether the ICC can do a good job.

 

[jeevan]

I think what has riled up the Australians the most is the fact that in the past, it had been fait accompli and accepted convention that everyone accepted the nomination, in spite of any concerns that nations have had about the candidate.

Changing that convention so that the confirmation step has teeth should be a good thing. Will lead to closer scrutiny of candidates all the way through and thus lead to an increased professionalism of the people coming through. Starting with about Dalmia, there appeared to be a decline (in cricket administration terms) in standards of the leadership at ICC.

This has raised the bar for nominations in the future, especially those coming from the countries that vetoed Howard (including India). That is definitely a positive.

CA has the right to be peeved at an oligarchy suddenly switching to a more democratic mode of operation, but I hope they don't conflate that emotion with continuing with the candidacy of someone who clearly does not have the support he needs to run the thing. I hope they channel their anger towards persisting with this new mode of appointing ICC leadership.

 

[Matt79]

Your kidding yourself if you think this is a victory for democracy or accountability. All that's happened is that the interregnum between the old English-Australia regime and the new corrupt oligarchy is now clearly over. You seriously think there's going to be more 'accountability' or scrutiny of the next corrupt Indian politician to be put up for a leadership role in the ICC? Or that this makes it more or less likely that decisions will be made for the good of the game rather than the good of the group that now have the numbers? Look forward to the 2015 WC being moved from Australia and never coming back under this new model.

 

[silentstriker]

Look forward to the 2015 WC being moved from Australia and never coming back under this new model.

That's a little overboard....

 

[jeevan]

Your kidding yourself if you think this is a victory for democracy or accountability. All that's happened is that the interregnum between the old English-Australia regime and the new corrupt oligarchy is now clearly over. You seriously think there's going to be more 'accountability' or scrutiny of the next corrupt Indian politician to be put up for a leadership role in the ICC? Or that this makes it more or less likely that decisions will be made for the good of the game rather than the good of the group that now have the numbers? Look forward to the 2015 WC being moved from Australia and never coming back under this new model.

It's not a victory for anything, just a relief valve in the system kicking in, as designed but quite unexpectedly used.

The boards that voted against Howard are not a monolith and BCCI was hardly a leader of them for this vote, more likely that it was a follower - Zimbabwe,SA & SL had taken far more strident a position wrt Howard.

Accountability we can only hope for, but scrutiny - yes I believe that will be a consequence. Actually politicians involved in cricket in India are recently (and unconnected with this episode) already under intense scrutiny. Modi, Shashi Tharoor and even Pawar all under varying amounts of it.