Get Butt off the chair

A shameless pun, I know. And the sad thing is I’m probably the umpteenth person to use it.

But seriously, Ijaz Butt needs to go. Few administrators, even in the hectic world of the PCB, have managed to wreak havoc with such wanton glee as the current chief seems to be doing. In the latest addition to a 17-month term that could feature a sadistic tragicomedy for its dramatic knife-twists and turns, Mr. Butt has slapped five senior members of Pakistan’s 2009-10 Australia tour with hefty fines, and is currently mulling over a year-long ban.

Allegedly guilty as charged are a) Shahid Afridi, for confusing a cricket ball with a perfumed apple; b) Kamran Akmal, for terrible keeping, worse excuses, and overconfidence in his selection; c) Umar Akmal, for allegedly trying to protest his brother’s eventual non-selection by allegedly feigning a back injury; d) Shoaib Malik, for alleged but unidentified trouble-stirring, and e) Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, who appears guilty of nothing more than a terrible haircut but is allegedly capable of far, far worse.

The key word there, of course, is alleged. Nothing, Afridi’s antic and Kamran’s slip-ups aside, has been proven. A lot of it was media speculation and gossip that caught the officials’ eye. But naturally, to show us it’s not every day he falls asleep at work and he is still kicking, Mr. Butt decides to take a hard line.

The punishments: For Afridi and the Akmals, fines of a few million rupees and probation. For Afridi, the probation includes a “no captaincy” condition. For Malik and Rana, possible one-year bans.

Firstly, Pakistan’s 2009-10 tour to Australia was a disaster. Against an out-of-form, almost reserve team they slumped to a shocking nine consecutive defeats, the worst by a side on tour. So an investigation was to be expected; the shot was definitely on.

But not this shot. A slap on the wrist and a short-term replacement would have sufficed for the wicketkeeper. Umar Akmal’s alleged tantrum is just that, alleged. Malik is as guilty of verbal dissent as is his captain Mohammad Yousuf. The pair gel smoothly on the field–they’ve shared 2468 runs, at 49.36, in one-days international partnerships–but can’t leave the field without clawing each other’s hair out. Rana tries his heart out for Pakistan and reports of indiscipline hardly warrant a year-long ban.

Afridi, already punished for his act, has had his case reopened by the insufferable politicians who seek to gain public approval by prying into every detail that does not concern them, while failing to address the issues that do. The same plotters whose “investigation” into a promising team forced Younus Khan’s resignation, and led to a downward spiral in the last four months. And Butt sahab, true to form, not only lets them but decides to add in his own special mix of senility and histrionics.

This is the same management that stops Shoaib Akhtar from playing and subsequently decides not to select him because he lacks match practice. The same management that exhausted their efforts after the Lahore attack on pointing fingers and making bluff statements. The same management, too, that talks Pakistan’s financial losses up to the world while taking every opportunity to humiliate the players.

The Pakistan team has a history of discipline problems. Quite a few have been exaggerated, some perhaps made up. Mr. Butt, it appears, has decided to throw caution to the wind and pin it all on five alleged culprits.

In doing so he forgets, quite conveniently, that the worst culprit is the board itself.