NEWS
SCHEDULES
COLUMNS
PREVIOUS TOURS
OTHER SPORTS
STATISTICS
INTERVIEWS
SLIDE SHOW
ARCHIVES

Cassim's June 26 testimony

MR MANCA: Yes. Thank you Mr Commissioner. So he hadn't phoned you before then had he?

MR CASSIM: Sorry come again with that.

MR MANCA: Okay let me just bluntly put it to you, there were two test matches which took place before the One-day series. The One-day series started at the conclusion of the end of the two test matches and the first one day game was played at Cochin. Is that when you had the first telephone call from Mr Sanjay Chawla to you when the South African team was in India?

MR CASSIM: I don't remember when he called me first but I think when he called me to say that he was staying at Cochin I do remember that one.

MR MANCA: Alright, can you recall why he phoned you when he said he was staying in a hotel in Cochin?

MR CASSIM: He told me he was going to watch the matches.

MR MANCA: I see. Now just take some time to think about it if you need to. You have a definite recollection of him phoning you from a hotel in Cochin. Is that also according to your recollection the first time that he phoned you when you were in India? This is Sanjay. Sorry when the South African team were in India not when you were in India, sorry.

MR CASSIM: I think he went to watch those test matches as well in India. He probably could have called me from the venues in India.

MR MANCA: So you concede that Mr Chawla could have called you during the test matches as well which was before the first One-day international in Cochin?

MR CASSIM: Possibly.

MR MANCA: Now you said that he phoned you from Cochin to talk to you about the game?

MR CASSIM: No, not about the game.

MR MANCA: About what?

MR CASSIM: Whenever Sanjay would call me is that he couldn't get hold of Hansie he said please I would like to speak Hansie if you can get hold of him.

MR MANCA: So when was staying in the hotel in Cochin he called you to get hold of Mr Cronjé, is that correct?

MR CASSIM: That's correct.

MR MANCA: Did you know that Sanjay Chawla stayed in the same hotel in Cochin as the South African team?

MR CASSIM: Yes.

MR MANCA: And yet he's phoning you in South Africa to get hold of Mr Cronjé when they're in the same hotel in India.

MR CASSIM: Possibly he did not want to go to Mr Cronjé's room, I can't answer for Sanjay.

MR MANCA: How many times can you recall did Mr Sanjay phone you when the South African team was in India for you to get hold of Hansie, in order to ask Mr Cronjé to contact Sanjay?

MR CASSIM: My assumption could be twenty to thirty times.

MR MANCA: Twenty to thirty times Sanjay contacted you in order to get hold of Mr Cronjé.

MR CASSIM: That's correct.

MR MANCA: Do you want to show me that bit in your statement where you say that Sanjay contacted you twenty or thirty times to get hold of Mr Cronjé. You maybe just look at your statement. It's not there is it?

COMMISSIONER: Look at 8.26.

MR CASSIM: Do you want to maybe read paragraph 8.26 of your statement.

COMMISSIONER: ...you read Mr Cassim that your version may not perhaps be the corrected one, let me just read the first line to you Mr Manca, "I have did however receive..." and then the article A is crossed out, "phone calls", plural, from Sanjay. It doesn't detract from your question but I want you to have the right factual basis for it, MR MANCA: No Mr Commissioner, I don't want to make a mountain out of a mole-hill but the difficulty that I have is I don't just have a statement, I've got a copy of a signed affidavit and my affidavit is signed on the 6th of June before a Commissioner of Oaths in Johannesburg and 8.26 of my affidavit says the following, "I did however receive a phone call from Sanjay." May I ask when a copy of your affidavit was deposed to?

COMMISSIONER: You may and if somebody will furnish me with the last page I will be able to answer you. Can I just have a - page 17 of this original was here, then when this was removed in order to attach page 14, page 17 disappeared. I didn't raise it previously because it was read out to me and it didn't until this moment contain anything that I felt was particularly of relevance.

MS BATOHI: We do have page 17 but it's a copy, it's not the original.

COMMISSIONER: Mr Manca, this copy purports to have been signed on the 6th of June, Commissioner of Oaths a Mr Moodley an attorney, 2nd floor something or other Business Centre, West Tower Sandton Square.

MR MANCA: The same as my copy, and my learned friend Fitzgerald's. May I ask, if I may just through you Mr Commissioner ask if at paragraph 8.26 if there's anything approximating what would look like initials either by the witness or by the Commissioner of Oaths.

COMMISSIONER: Yes there's an initial which looks to me like Mr Cassim's initial against the alterations but not the Commissioner of Oaths, as far as I can make out.

MR MANCA: Thank you Mr...(intervention)

Click here for more....