Player safety only bar to Zimbabwe tour, says Goff

Human rights campaigner Judith Todd and former Zimbabwe cricketer Henry Olonga led the march in Auckland today. Picture / Glenn Jeffrey

Only player safety concerns are likely to stop the New Zealand cricket tour of Zimbabwe next month, Foreign Minister Phil Goff said today.

Mr Goff was speaking after a meeting between New Zealand officials, including High Commissioner to London Jonathan Hunt, and International Cricket Council president Ehsan Mani.

The meeting was to discuss what measures would exempt New Zealand Cricket from heavy penalties if it cancelled the tour.

Mr Goff said Mr Mani's response was not unexpected - that in all circumstances a tour should proceed unless it became illegal or there was a risk to the players.

"I think the only and probably most likely way of that tour not going ahead is the security situation on the ground as a result of what is happening there persuades the New Zealand cricketers they should not be touring," he said.

Last month, NZC said an independent security report from Zimbabwe had given the all clear on the issue of player safety.

Mr Goff again ruled out legislation to stop the tour, saying no government in New Zealand had legislated against its own people leaving the country.

"To do so without consultation, without submissions to a parliamentary committee, to ram it through under urgency would appear to us to be inappropriate."

He said a suggestion that protesters were due to put to him at an Auckland rally today - that a representative team should be prevented from going, but not individuals - was a contradiction.

"It's kind of phoney because it doesn't stop the tour," he said.

It would also create the precedent of the Government legislating to instruct independent organisations where its people could travel.

Mr Goff said New Zealand would continue with a diplomatic offensive to try to force change in Zimbabwe.

It would include trying to get Zimbabwe excluded from the International Money Fund and investigating whether a case could be brought against Zimbawean president Robert Mugabe in the International Criminal Court.

Representations were also being made to the European Union and to Zimbabwe's immediate neighbours.

The rally in central Auckland was preceded by a march up Queen St.

The march was led by former Zimbabwe test cricketer Henry Olonga and long-time human rights activist Judith Todd, daughter of New Zealand-born Sir Garfield Todd, who was Prime Minister of Rhodesia (now called Zimbabwe) and a member of the Zimbabwe independence movement.

Co-organiser John Minto said Mr Goff would be given "a clear message that the Government has to do more than just bluff or bluster".

Mr Olonga and Ms Todd spoke at a public meeting in Auckland last night when a resolution was passed calling on the Government to take all steps necessary to stop the tour without interfering with New Zealanders' right to travel.

Mr Minto believed New Zealand, either by legislation or by the moral weight of Parliament, could prevent a national representative team from going to Zimbabwe.

"If that happened, the whole tour would collapse."

- NZPA