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Symcox's June 7 testimony

COMMISSIONER: May I just ask you if you're able to do so, to give me some indication of the length of time that this meeting took? I'm talking about the meeting, not the subsequent gathering.

MR SYMCOX: If it took a half-an-hour it would have been long.

COMMISSIONER: And Andrew Hudson and the other two gentlemen that you mentioned, Mr Crookes and Mr Cullinan, Andrew Hudson in particular, did he come straight out up front, sort of, with an immediate response to the offer, and say, 'Look, I'm not interested it's - '?

MR SYMCOX: Yes. No, he definitely did.

COMMISSIONER: And then the other two supported him immediately thereafter. Is that so?

MR SYMCOX: Yes.

COMMISSIONER: So, I'm not tying you down to time estimates, but it strikes me from what you say, as if there must still then have been a fair amount of discussion as to whether or not to accept the offer. Is that right?

MR SYMCOX: Not really. When I say, half-an-hour, let's say it was 20 minutes. But you know, when you get into a meeting and you end up sitting down and you have a chat and - it didn't seem a long meeting. In my mind it doesn't seem a long meeting.

COMMISSIONER: Yes, Mr Gauntlett.

MR GAUNTLETT: Mr Symcox, after those events did it occur to you later that it was funny that Woolmer hadn't been invited to that meeting, and that perhaps Woolmer should be apprised of this, or perhaps even Dr Bacher himself?

MR SYMCOX: No, certainly now looking back it does seem - it does seem wrong. But on that tour Bob Woolmer wasn't in the room, and for whatever reason, and probably a good reason, because he wasn't part of the playing set up. So I look back now, it was strange, but he definitely wasn't in that meeting.

MR GAUNTLETT: That you've already testified about. I'm asking you whether afterwards it wasn't thought, 'We'd better tell them about it.' Did you not think that?

MR SYMCOX: Well, that wasn't for me to do, you know, I was just part of the - I didn't in any way think, 'Well, I'm going to walk out here and go and tell Bob Woolmer we just had a meeting and he wasn't there and this has happened.' It didn't occur to me like that.

MR GAUNTLETT: Or at any time thereafter?

MR SYMCOX: It was much - it was quite talked about. It wasn't as if it was a State secret in that room, and nobody would talk about it. People talked about.

MR GAUNTLETT: No, Mr Symcox. That's not the point. Did it thereafter occur to you to disclose it to Woolmer or Bacher or to anybody else other then ...(intervention)

MR SYMCOX: No, it didn't.

MR GAUNTLETT: ...other then those who had been invited to that room?

MR SYMCOX: No, it didn't.

MR GAUNTLETT: Finally, Mr Symcox, you referred to another incident when Cronje asked you about throwing a game against Pakistan, and you indicated that your advise was not to worry about it. Could you just help? Can you remember what the proposal was that was under discussion?

MR SYMCOX: I can't remember the exact figure. All he indicated to me was that he'd had an offer on behalf of the team to lose the match tomorrow night against Pakistan in Cape Town, and should he approach the team or what do I think. And I said I didn't think so.

MR GAUNTLETT: Could you just help us on the date of that?

MR SYMCOX: I don't know the exact date off the top of my head, but I remember it being the Mandela Trophy game against Pakistan in Cape Town at Newlands. And the final followed at the Wanderers.

COMMISSIONER: What was the result? Can you remember?

MR SYMCOX: Yes. No, we beat Pakistan quite handsomely.

MR GAUNTLETT: Thank you, Mr COMMISSIONER.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR GAUNTLETT

COMMISSIONER: Thank you, Mr Gauntlett. Mr Gishen?

MR GISHEN: I have no questions, thank you.

COMMISSIONER: May I just, before I ask MR DICKERSON to question you, Mr Symcox. You've got time constraints, have you? What's your position?

MR SYMCOX: I leave to Sri Lanka over the weekend to commentate for 2 months, and I'm back on the 16th of August, and then - but I have ...(intervention)

COMMISSIONER: You probably want to get home.

MR SYMCOX: Yes, and I need to pack and get ready to go.

COMMISSIONER: We'll see how we go, and if necessary and it only involves a short extension of the court hours - the Inquiry's hours for today, I'm happy to sit, to conclude Mr Symcox's evidence if we possibly can. Carry on MR DICKERSON.

MR DICKERSON: Thank you, Mr COMMISSIONER. Mr Symcox, to start with the last answer you gave, the proposal that was conveyed to you regarding the match against Pakistan in Cape Town, you indicated that you can't recall the exact date. I understand from Mr Cronje that he recalls that incident and by his recollection, it took place in 1994. Do you accept that that could be so?

MR SYMCOX: Well, when was the Mandela Trophy played? That game in Cape Town?

MR DICKERSON: I understand from him that that was in 1994.

MR SYMCOX: I can recollect it is the game that we played Pakistan in Cape Town. If it was - when it was.

MR DICKERSON: Do you think you could be mistaken in that regard?

MR SYMCOX: Well, as I've said, the date - all I'm saying to you it was the Mandela Trophy match against Pakistan in Cape Town.

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