The ICC’s big risk

Staging the Cricket World Cup in India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka poses serious security challenges. Host City speaks to the man responsible: Mandela’s former bodyguard.

Since the 9/11 attacks, security measures have been tightened for major sports events as they are perceived as prime targets for terrorist and activist groups. This is also influencing hosting decisions, with many international sports governing bodies exercising caution.

The attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore
is still fresh in the memory of the cricketing world

But not the International Cricket Council (ICC). As enthusiasm for the sport spreads around the world, the ICC welcomes fresh challenges. The 2003 ICC Cricket World Cup was hosted in South Africa, an emerging nation that by many was regarded as an unsafe destination. The 2007 hosting rights were bestowed on a cluster of nine little countries known as the West Indies – Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia and Trinidad and Tobago – with little to no experience in hosting international events, let alone experience in working together at such high level.

For the 2011 event the risk factor has gone up even further with India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka being granted the responsibility of hosting the event. The ICC was forced to strip the fourth co-host, Pakistan, of its right to hold matches after the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, Pakistan in March 2009. The remaining three hosts also have their own domestic security challenges to deal with.

Ensuring that the 2011 is safe is a job bestowed on Rory Steyn and his team at the South African company Nicholls Steyn and Associates. When it comes to providing safety and security to high profile people and events, Steyn can rely on years of experience, dating back to the days when he headed the personal security team of the first democratically elected South African president Nelson Mandela. He also provided security for the All Blacks rugby team when they toured South Africa.

Steyn has been involved in the Cricket World Cup security since 1999, when he flew to the UK to gain first-hand knowledge in preparation for the 2003 event in South Africa. He was head of security during the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies.

Disharmony in the Caribbean
Although the security challenges of the West Indies cannot be compared to those of the southern Asian hosts, valuable lessons were learned from 2007. “It is essential that the organisation will be coordinated. In 2007 we faced nine legal jurisdictions, nine different telecom providers, six different cricket associations and five different currencies. This caused much confusion and unnecessary delays,” Steyn says.

This created major problems that he wants to avoid in 2011, which will be a much bigger tournament. “It is essential that activities are harmonized and information is shared. I always advise to have one centrally managed Local Organising Committee instead of a decentralised LOC.”

While he insists that overall he was satisfied with the arrangements in 2007, he admits that he was concerned by the lack of experience of many within the security team. "The start of the event was rockier than we would have liked, because we weren't able to train our staff properly," he told press agency Reuters at the time. "You are asking a cadre of security staff to secure a venue, and they don't know what it looks like because of all the temporary stands and other overlay that has been applied to the stadia.”

This problem occurred because some of the venues that were used were only finished the night prior to the first match, leaving staff and officials no time to practice and be properly trained.

“The best thing to do is test early and decide late,” says Steyn. “Rather find out about the glitches as early as possible and leave the final decision up to weeks or days prior to the event than only finding out days prior to the start. By that time you won’t have the time, energy and resources anymore to have that sorted.”

The failure of either India or Pakistan to make it through to the Super 8s – the quarterfinals – gave the security director some extra headaches. “Because both teams didn’t make it to the next round we had to adjust our security plans, as well as the fact that we suddenly faced other challenges. That and the Bob Woolmer incident we consider as something that seriously went wrong at the 2007 tournament.” The incident Steyn refers to is the death of the South African cricket legend, hours after the Pakistani team he was coaching failed to make it to the next round. Although forensics revealed months later that Woolmer died of natural causes, the local police commissioner Mark Shields had immediately launched a murder investigation. This placed serious stress on the tournament’s security as claims of frustrated fans and even the involvement of match fixing criminals suddenly had to be investigated.

“That is the last thing you want; having somebody like a local police commissioner claiming his five minutes of fame,” Steyn says.

India at “extreme risk”
For the 2011 event problems like this must be avoided. While the chance of a serious incident were slim at the low-profile and laid-back Caribbean countries, the 2011 event is a different animal altogether. India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are all dealing with security threats of growing magnitude. Over the course of 2009 they all dropped in the rankings of the Dynamic Political Risk Index, which measures conflict, terrorism, regime stability and corruption. Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are both deemed high risk countries. Bangladesh has an added element of uncertainty as it has never hosted an event of this magnitude before. The index categorises India as “extreme risk” in the categories of conflict, political violence and terrorism. India is fighting elements in its society that have proven capable of staging attacks that have left many people dead, and dented the feeling of safety and security. These include the attacks by Pakistani extremists on various buildings in Mumbai, India’s biggest economical hub, which killed more than 100 people in November 2008. Steyn’s partner, Bob Nicholls, was there at the time and experienced terrorism first hand.

While this experience taught Nicholls Steyn and Associates some valuable lessons, Steyn prefers to not divulge any information prior to the 2011 event other than saying that “governing bodies need to exercise care where they allow major sports events to be staged”.

Focus on practicalities
Instead of dwelling on the threat of terror at the 2011 Cricket World Cup, Steyn is more worried about the simple practical things that can get in the way of running a complex event effectively.

“Time and distance is very important,” he says. “In the West-Indies it could take hours to travel from the one location to the other as venues were often located in places with no immediate access to airports. And even if so, there was still a time delay due to complicated customs requirements.” In 2011 things will not be much better as venues will be spread all over a region that is many times bigger than the Caribbean’s in 2007.

If the organisation of the West Indies event was characterised by an overly relaxed attitude, Steyn can rely on a focused and experienced mindset for 2011. With the Indian Premier League (IPL) being one of the most commercial sporting organisations in the world, the country has gained a wealth of experience in dealing with high-profile cricket events in recent years. The other hosting nations have also proven themselves to be capable of handling risks.

For Steyn this means he only has to focus on fine-tuning the process. “It will be important to have a proper event manual in which everything is properly described. The tournament and each stadium must have their own checklist, while the match day itself will be put down in a Match Day Run sheet. On top of that we have the communication strategy. If we can have all of this properly sorted, we should be able to succeed.”

Pakistan has threatened to withdraw completely from any involvement in the Cup. However, the ICC has scheduled the team to start in Group A, creating the possibility of a late stage encounter with India, who are in Group B. These two arch-rivals have played a significant role in cricket history and a derby would guarantee capacity crowds and record TV audience figures. It would also confirm the 2011 Cricket World Cup’s status as one of the riskiest mega-events of all time.