The Hindu : Sport : A farcical hearing comes to an end

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Dec 06, 2006
ePaper

Sport

Sport - Sports : General

A farcical hearing comes to an end

K.P. Mohan

NEW DELHI: The World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) will be reviewing the decision of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) appeals panel that cleared Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif and, if satisfied that there are enough grounds for appeal, may approach the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), Lausanne.

In a communication from Doha, WADA's Media Relations Manager, Frederic Donze, said on Tuesday: "WADA will now review the reasons for the decision, liaise with the International Cricket Council (ICC) and consider whether to exercise its right of appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport." This is WADA's known position with regard to all such cases where the organizations concerned (in this case the ICC) have accepted the anti-doping code, known simply as the Code.

Ambiguous jurisdiction

However, WADA's jurisdiction in this case, unlike any other sport, is slightly ambiguous since the ICC the anti-doping code is not worth falling back on. For one thing, the ICC code is not binding on all its member units and players in the broadest sense, as is the case with the rules of all other international federations. For another, the ICC code is not a comprehensive document on anti-doping matters and talks only about ICC events.

There is no mention about out-of-competition testing either, unless one is referring to a brief period prior to and immediately after an ICC event like the World Cup or the Champions Trophy.

Still, the news that the PCB applied the "exceptional circumstances" rule while reprieving the two cricketers should be encouraging in case the WADA is looking for a possible appeal.

Reports from Pakistan, quoted the panel chief, Fakhruddin Ibrahim, a retired judge, as saying that it was evident that neither Shoaib Akhtar nor Mohammad Asif was ever warned or cautioned against taking supplements.

Common excuse

In the anti-doping parlance, the word `supplements' had become such a common excuse that rule-makers had made it a point to mention it in the rules a long time ago. In fact a federation like the IAAF (athletics) specifically bars a plea under the "exceptional circumstances" rule that the substance could have come from a supplement.

Says the WADA Code in its explanatory note on exceptional circumstances: "A sanction could not be completely eliminated on the basis of no fault or negligence in the following circumstances: a) a positive test resulting from a mislabeled or contaminated vitamin or nutritional supplement... b) the administration of a prohibited substance by the athletes personal physician or trainer without disclosure to the athlete... c) sabotage of the athlete's food or drink by a spouse, coach or other persons... However, depending on the unique facts of a particular case, any of the above instances could be considered for a reduced sanction under "no significant fault or negligence" clause.

The PCB appeals panel has apparently wiped the sanction out in one stroke on the simple argument that the cricketers were not told and nor were they aware of the presence of prohibited substances in the supplements.

It was the committee's view that Akhtar and Asif had successfully established that they had "an honest and reasonable belief that the supplements ingested by them did not contain any prohibited substances."

The question that will arise is: "Did the cricketers prove how the banned substance entered their body fluids?" This is a pre-requisite for a reduction of the sanction under the `exceptional circumstances' rule. Simply saying "it must have come from the supplements I took" normally does not help an athlete in his defence in a doping appeal.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport