SA inquiry proposes phone taps

South African Test cricketers may have their phones tapped and be forced to take lie detector tests if the government accepts proposals tabled by the inquiry into the country's match-fixing scandal.

"It is unfortunately necessary for players' telephone calls and also e-mails to be monitored," the commission's second interim report said.

"A somewhat drastic proposal is that players should contractually authorise the undergoing of a polygraph test which would be undertaken either at random or when there are grounds for suspicion present," it said.

Judge Edwin King, who has been leading the inquiry since it was set up in June, told a news conference the measures would not contravene the human rights clauses in South Africa's constitution.

Mail Cricket Editor