The Times of India
25 January 2012
Zimbabwe sports minister David Coltart has once again urged England to revive cricket ties with the southern African nation.
Coltart’s lobbying efforts have managed to sway Australia and New Zealand to tour the country following years of boycotts on political grounds, but the British government prohibits England to host or visit Zimbabwe.
England last hosted and visited Zimbabwe in 2004 but played its team in 2007 at the Twenty20 World Tournament.
Earlier this month, Coltart met with British foreign secretary William Hague in London during the World Education Forum and the pair briefly discussed re-establishing cricket ties.
“It went well. I proposed dialogue between the two countries and he said they will consider it,” Coltart said. “He said they have taken into account what I said. He didn’t give any undertaking but he wasn’t negative.”
Coltart is a founding member of the Movement for Democratic Change party that forced Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party into a coalition government after the disputed 2008 elections.
He has previously defended his lobbying efforts, saying the coalition government has addressed some of the concerns that brought the imposition of the sporting sanctions.
“Tours of that nature bind relations and reconcile nations,” Coltart said. “Tours do not benefit a single party. They benefit the entire nation. They also help our cricket. A good example is that the tour by Australia ‘A’ and New Zealand last year lifted morale and helped raise the standard of our game.
“The trouble with playing England is that in the foreseeable future on the ICC calendar, England are only scheduled to play Zimbabwe in about 2016. There doesn’t seem to be a reasonable scheduled timeframe by the ICC. We offered New Zealand and Australia a unique opportunity to play this past winter because of the fact that unlike in other southern hemisphere countries, we can play cricket during our winter.”