SYDNEY — Cricket fans in Australia have been threatened with on-the-spot fines and stadium bans in a crackdown on racism, officials said yesterday.
Members of the touring South African team lodged a complaint of racial abuse during the opening Test in Perth last week, just a week after the eastern city of Sydney was rocked by two nights of racial violence.
Cricket Australia has ordered a thorough review of security arrangements for the second Test, starting in Melbourne on Monday, officials said at a news conference held yesterday.
Security guards at the ground will be briefed on the nature of the racist slurs that are unfamiliar to most Australians.
According to local newspapers, the South Africans were called “kaffirs” and “kaffir boeties”, derogatory terms for black people and black sympathisers, during the Test in Perth, the capital of western Australia.
Security staff at the match did not take action because they were unaware of what the terms meant. Perth has a large expatriate South African community.
Cricket Australia’s CE James Sutherland said that any trouble-makers would be faced with on-the-spot fines and expulsion from the venue. They could even face permanent bans.
“I understand from experience overseas that there are various methods they have of banning trouble-makers from soccer matches for example,” Sutherland said in his briefing
“I would hope that sport in Australia doesn’t need to get to that stage.
“But if we do have serious problems — like some of the serious problems that they have experienced overseas — obviously some of these measures would be well supported by us.”
South African captain Graeme Smith said that the abuse had been unacceptable.
“Our guys are pretty upset about it and something needed to be done,” he said. “We expected to cop a bit of general abuse but this was pushing the limits as far as we were concerned.”
Australian captain Ricky Ponting reacted to the incidents earlier in the week, by saying: “There’s no room in sport for racism whatsoever.
“ The players are all very aware of that, the crowd needs to be aware of that and enjoy the game for what it is,” he said.
The southern Sydney beach of Cronulla, a mainly white community, erupted into rioting on December 11 when a large crowd, whipped into a frenzy by white supremacists and fuelled by alcohol, turned on anyone of Middle Eastern appearance.
Lebanese youths retaliated over two nights, attacking people and vandalising cars in several suburbs. A major police crackdown, which has led to some beachside suburbs being “locked down”, restored calm to Sydney.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard said that he believed the Christmas and New Year holiday season would be peaceful in Sydney.
“I really am quite optimistic that people will see that nothing is ever achieved by violence,” Howard said at a briefing in Sydney yesterday. Reuters