Cricket Australia's AFL-style mediation plan
Chloe Saltau, in the Sydney Morning Herald , says Cricket Australia (CA) is lobbying for an AFL-style mediation plan to resolve racial disputes before the ICC.
ESPNcricinfo staff
25-Feb-2013
Chloe Saltau, in the Sydney Morning Herald, says Cricket Australia (CA) is lobbying for an AFL-style mediation plan to resolve racial disputes before the ICC.
The AFL is considered a world leader in confronting racial vilification, and won a United Nations award for the code established after Essendon champion Michael Long reacted to Collingwood's Damian Monkhorst racially abusing him in 1995. Since then, the first step in resolving incidents of racial abuse has been for the two players to attend a mediation session. If that fails, the matter proceeds to the AFL Tribunal.
Cricket Australia is advocating a similar system, in which mediation would ideally be confidential, and prosecution a last resort. The ICC is understood to have been unconvinced, but CA is determined to keep pushing for a less combative process that, in the first instance, aims for the offender to understand why a particular remark is unacceptable.
Ashok Ganguly is an editorial assistant at Cricinfo