Cricket

Is Alex Marshall an Offender or a Victim?

Alex Marshall is the General Manager of ICC Integrity Unit, which includes Anti-Corruption, Anti-Doping, Security and Safe Guarding.

 

An Offender - of mental & physical harassment to woman staff?

 

It is in the public domain through the articles published on 7th and 8th of September 2023 in News18.com, as reported by Sahil Malhotra about a former female staffer on workplace harassment, who raised the issue and pleaded ICC to hear her out, but without success. This raised very serious questions on the integrity of General Manager of Integrity Unit of ICC, Alex Marshall. Unfortunately, as of NOW, the reporting raised more questions than logical answers and that is making the reporting an ideal example of a case of dilettante.

 

Harassment and abuse as defined by the IOC Consensus statement – "Harassment and Abuse in Sports" as adopted by ICC and under ICC Guidance of Safeguarding Cricket in May 2019  – Guidance for Members, KEY ISSUES TO INCLUDE IN SAFEGUARDING POLICY AND RELATED PROCEDURES of article 3 Set out in Appendix A, are Guidelines which are intended to serve as minimum standards that Members can use as a basis for creating their own Safeguarding Policy and related procedures. Obviously, for ICC Management and Staff, are not unprotected within internal regulations and Rules / Legislation of the Land. It is to be noted that ICC is a Company limited by guarantee that is not authorized to issue shares and governed as the Member based company.

 

Technically ICC do have a strong Check & Balance system in its administration and management, through different committees, even for influential people of ICC.

 

The ICC Integrity Unit, where Alex Marshall is the General Manager, is oversighted by a very powerful committee called INDEPENDENT OVERSIGHT GROUP OF THE ANTI CORRUPTION UNIT. This Committee is Chaired by the globally renowned and respected sporting world in the area of integrity called David Howman, who is a former Barrister. He is also the Chairman of the Athletes Integrity Unit, having been re-appointed to that position by the IAAF Council in September 2019, the Chair of World Squash Ethics Commission, Deputy Chair of the ITF Ethics Commission, and Chair of the ICC Anti-Corruption Oversight Group where Sally Clark, head of legal Department is the Management Support.

 

The process and procedures to participate against "workplace harassment" by any ICC male or female staff is absolutely predetermined and clear.

 

Question 1. Has the lady complainant acted and participated CORRECTLY as per SOP and standard requisite under ICC procedure, to the right entity?

 

From the article we understand that she was scared to report by email, therefore made hand delivery of her complaint and still did not get justice.

 

It is not clear in the as reported by Sahil Malhotra in the articles; when she left the job? Was it after complaining in an unusual scary manner and for not getting her expected justice or she is now complaining after demission as unable to continue and harassed by Alex Marshall?

 

Let us assume that she made the complains while still at service but did not get justice.

 

Therefore as we know ICC do have another very powerful Committee, for similar cases called "Dispute Resolution Committee" which is Chaired by an independent legal luminaire called Machael Jacob Beloff,  an English Barrister  and arbitrator. A member of Blackstone Chambers, he practices in a number of areas including human rights, administrative law and sports law. From 1995 until 2014 he was a member of the Jersey Court of Appeal  and the Guernsey Court of Appeal and senior ordinary appeal Judge for six years. He sits on the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which deals with disputes including doping offences on behalf of the International Olympic Committee. He has also chaired the ethics commission of the  IAAF, including investigations into IAAF treasurer Valentin Balakhnichev and Papa Massata Diack, son of IAAF president Lamine Diack.

 

Furthermore, Mike Heron with area of expertise in civil, criminal, Disciplinary proceedings and Dispute Resolution (ADR and/or Litigation) and Justice Winstron Anderson are two most important and independent members to assist Independent Chairman Beloff, in this Dispute resolution Committee.

 

Question 2. Has the lady complainant acted and participated CORRECTLY as per SOP and standard requisite under ICC procedure after not getting justice as she expected from others?

 

OR

 

A Victim - of organized crime of Match Fixing / illegal betting?

 

As an investigating sports reporter, we have some important information which we would like to share with our readers from very reliable sources that:

 

1.  General Manager Alex Marshall of ICC Integrity Unit, which includes Anti-Corruption; is involved in a high-level investigation of very big rackets of on-line illegal betting and Match fixing to the tune of not thousands but MANY millions of USD transactions involving NEW ILLEGAL GLOBAL BETTING & MATCH FIXING market of Non-ICC Associate Member tournaments, mainly in Africa Continent.  This dramatic trend started since the Associate members are counted in official ICC T20I rankings among all members, including Full and Associate members.

 

2.  The corrupt process is operated through live sports streaming websites of Universal Resource Locator (URL) secured under OTT and/or mobile/wireless rights, mainly by PPV (pay per view) registration and illegal betting.  The investigation started in the beginning of 2022.

 

3.  Africa is the principal playing field for illegal activity due to open collaboration of certain East African countries like Tanzania, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda, all Gujarati & Swahili speaking organizers and Nigeria ( new market) from Western Africa.

 

4.  Individuals involved are basically from Southern Asia origin / citizens but all having their companies registered and make financial transactions from Dubai and Sharjah of UAE.

 

5.  We have all the reasons to believe from our reliable sources that a serious break through by Alex Marshall is imminent and  unified the organized crime syndicate of DUBAI & SHARJAH of Cricket betting and Match Fixing kingpins to strategize the all out attack on Alex Marshall.

 

6.  We have all the reasons to believe from our reliable sources that allegedly illegal betting companies, all based in DUBAI are allegedly approaching the AFRICAN Associate member Countries to "Promote" their cricket and "Sponsoring" the Non-ICC multi nations T20 I Events.

 

7.  We have all the reasons to believe from our reliable sources that Alex Marshall is having very convincing information and certain data evidences on the routes, movements, local organizers and sources of Kingpins involved in this alleged illegal Cricket betting and fixing games in Africa and few low-ranking European Associate countries where Southern Asians are running the show.

 

8.      There is no secret related huge "money making" in the T20  final on 21st June 2023 at Nairobi between Uganda and Kenya, in the "Final of Continent Cup"  where just 4 countries participated and financed by DAFABET. Uganda scored 124 in 20 overs and home team Kenya lost by JUST 1 run by scoring 124 for 7, in 20 overs. It is allegedly believed that more than $880,000 USD were made in the match fixing of the Final. It is believed that Alex Marshall has some very important information on this aspect and is still working on collecting more reliable data evidence.

 

9.  We have received disturbing news, extremely harmful to Africa Associate Members that a Dubai based sponsoring company always projected as holier-than-thou, camouflaged with legitimate Agreement between them and Africa Cricket Association, is being exposed to their direct intimacy  with other Dubai/Sharjah based allegedly illegal betting and match fixing companies. It appears that Alex Marshall has very concrete evidence about this camouflaged illegal betting/match fixing amalgamation. Detailed information / identification about this "new" Company and its alleged illegal will be brought forward very soon.

 

10.  With all responsibility and serious conviction we inform the readers that the Lady, former employee of ICC  who complained against Alex Marshall is of Southern Asian origin and very well known to the 2 Southern Asian origin kingpins of the Dubai Based alleged illegal betting and match fixing companies.

 

With an important note we want to conclude for now that contrary to the report of News18.com by Sahil Malhotra,  ICC HR  Committee is Chaired by Pankaj Khimji, Director of ICC and 2 other ICC Director members are  Nazmul Hassan and Neil Speight and an independent member is  Peter Baker. Alex Marshall is the management support, not head of HR.