**Pakistan not to support Bacher for ICC post **
By Waheed Khan
KARACHI: The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has supported the nomination of a candidate from South Africa to take over as President of the International Cricket Council (ICC) for the next term which begins in 2006.
But sources in the board said that** Pakistan had given conditional support to the South African candidature for the President’s post at the last executive board meeting of the world body held in June.
“Pakistan has laid down the clear condition that it will not support the nomination of Dr Ali Bacher for the prime position in the ICC. But it will support any other nomination from the United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCB),” a source disclosed.**
Pakistan’s candidate Ehsan Mani is the present ICC President and he was nominated by Pakistan for the present term which expires in June 2006. Mani replaced Australian Malcolm Gray as the ICC chief.
**The source said that Pakistan was not willing to accept Dr Bacher’s nomination for the ICC post as it believed he still had to clear himself on the issue of making false accusations of match-fixing against the Pakistan team in the 1999 World Cup.
“Bacher refused to appear before the Justice Karamat Bhandari match-fixing commission into the allegations made by the South African cricket supremo that Pakistan had played ‘fixed’ games against Bangladesh and India in the '99 World Cup,” the source confided.
“Bacher has still not clarified his position on this count and has neither withdrawn his allegations as was desired by the Pakistan board,” the source stated.
**
Bacher was the managing director of the last World Cup in South Africa and was chief executive of the UCB when South Africa was readmitted to international cricket by the ICC in 1991. Bacher however chose India as the first country for his team’s official visit despite offers from Pakistan.
Bacher also had a run-in with the Pakistan board in 1998 when some Pakistan players were mugged in Johannesburg on that tour.
**The source said that PCB chief Lt-General Tauqir Zia had openly offered to support South Africa as the next country to head the ICC but also made his condition specific at the executive board meeting.
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Sounds like a fair deal to me. We have had problems with Ali Bacher so we should not support him. Anyone else would be just fine. Lets see if South Africa accpets this condition or if they will just go ahead and nominate Ali Bacher.