Howard's Way: Little Johnnie To Take Up the Reins at the ICC

The board of Cricket Australia have finally gone stark-raving, barking mad. They have decided, in their infinite wisdom, to nominate Australia’s former Prime Minister, John Howard, as the next president of the International Cricket Council.

By nominate, of course, they mean that he will become president in 2012 because the ICC presidency is decided on a rotating basis and, in 2012, it’s Australasia’s turn. That way we don’t have to have any awkward conflict by putting things to an actual vote.

Democracy, apparently, is not always a good thing.

After 11 years as Australia’s PM, Howard should be ideally suited to the political cesspool that is the ICC. He had to deal with a cabinet room full of politicians who hated him, so dealing these cricketing malcontents should be a walk in the park.

But it’s not just about running a committee. It’s about setting the direction for cricket the world over and that’s where Howard runs in to trouble. Despite his professed deep love for the game, he has never so much as run the bar at a local cricket club, let alone administer the game at any significant level.

Nor has he ever played the game at a respectable level. In fact, anyone who has seen the footage of him attempting to bowl when visiting Australian troops would doubt that Howard is even capable of playing cricket.

He also comes with a bit of baggage. Howard vocally campaigned for Zimbabwe to be removed from the Commonwealth. He also weighed into arguments over Muttiah Muralitharan’s bowling action, labelling him a chucker.

He managed to annoy Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf over the infamous Oval ball-tampering brouhaha. He picked a fight with the BCCI and  Cricket South Africa over the Mike Denness incident.

In short, he’s managed to put most of the cricketing world off-side.

Despite all of this, Howard would be a terrific choice if there was no other suitable candidate, but that’s not the case. New Zealand, the other Australasian member, was insistent that Sir John Anderson take up the role.

Anderson had been chairman of NZ Cricket for 13 years and had been that country’s representative on the ICC Board. Naturally, CA couldn’t support having someone who knew what they were doing representing the region—that would show them up as the incompetent fools that they are.

That CA didn’t nominate its own chairman, Jack Clarke, also tells you all you need to know about how cricket has been run in this country under his stewardship. CA may not be the best people to be making decisions on who should represent Australia.

Howard is divisive, obstinate and notoriously hard of hearing.If you take the word of his former cabinet colleagues, they say he's not good at listening either. Just what you need running an organisation besieged with international rivalries and petty jealousies.

He may be passionate about cricket, but that alone is not a qualification for the presidency of the ICC. I’m passionate about beer, but people aren’t lining up to let me run a brewery—dammit.

I had no choice but to put up with him running my country for 11 years and that’s long enough. I’m damned if I want him running a sport that I’m passionate about, too.