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After Investigation Delay Yorkshire Offer Soft Apology To Azeem Rafiq Over Racism Row

After investigation delay, Yorkshire offer soft apology to Azeem Rafiq over racism row

At last, the Yorkshire County Cricket Club has made public the results of an “extensive” investigation it had launched into the allegations of racism made by their former player Azeem Rafiq.

The county club acknowledged that the investigation revealed that Rafiq must have faced some sort of “inappropriate behaviour” at some point in time during the period the leg spinner has complained of and issued an apology for the same.

However, not all the allegations were upheld by an independent panel chaired by Dr Samir Pathak, a consultant pancreatic surgeon at St. James’s University Hospital in Leeds, along with a trustee of the MCC Foundation and a member of the MCC Cricket Committee.

The Yorkshire CCC said that the panel could not gather “sufficient evidence” to determine the authenticity of allegations made by Rafiq.

“There were many allegations made against the Club most of which relate to a period more than ten years ago. Many of the allegations were not upheld and for others there was insufficient evidence for the Panel to make a determination. It is right, however, to acknowledge from the outset that several of the allegations made by Azeem were upheld and that sadly, historically, Azeem was the victim of inappropriate behaviour. This is clearly unacceptable. We would like to express our profound apologies for this,” the Yorkshire CCC said in a statement.

Notably, Rafiq had in September last year complained of racism he said he faced from the Yorkshire CCC that started way back in the year 2008. The county club launched an investigation in the following month while it carried with new witnesses coming forward as late as in April earlier this year.

Earlier this week, Rafiq took a dig at the administrators of Yorkshire for delaying the publication of the findings of the investigation and had called on the ECB to press the county to publish the report.

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