administrator

THE Australian Rugby Union was in uproar last night after a no-confidence vote in Queensland director Terry Jackman triggered a three-week delay in the election of a new ARU chairman.
The day's drama was expected to revolve around the rivalry between Arvid Petersen (NSW) and Peter McGrath (ACT).

They will contest the chairman's position that was to have been vacated yesterday by Ron Graham, but instead the ARU directors' disciplining of Jackman for allegedly breaching board confidentiality left the game's governing body in an unprecedented state of limbo. With the appointment put on hold until May 10, the incumbent board will administer the game until then.

The manoeuvring for a boardroom majority in the battle to become chairman began when Travis Hall, believed to be leaning in favour of McGrath, was dumped as the players' representative on the board and replaced by former Wallaby Mark Connors, who is understood to back "reform candidate" Petersen.

But there was to be even more blood on the floor. As predicted in The Australian yesterday, the meeting opened with some of Jackman's fellow directors moving a vote of no-confidence in him, alleging he had leaked to the media sensitive board information on the decision not to extend chief executive Gary Flowers' contract beyond this year.

However, there was speculation that the real rationale behind the no-confidence motion was to deprive former Football Federation Australia boss John O'Neill of one of his main supporters, thereby jeopardising the campaign aimed at recalling him to his old position in rugby.

Jackman left the boardroom, where the vote then went against him. The Queensland Rugby Union had re-nominated him as one of two delegates but just before the election, ARU president Paul McLean informed delegates of the no-confidence motion and the subsequent vote went 10-4 against Jackman.

Queensland's three delegates supported Jackman, which indicates NSW representatives failed to follow the convention hammered out between the two states that they would not question each other's board recommendations.

Because Queensland no longer had its constitutional allocation of two ARU directors, McLean refused to allow the incoming board - with Petersen newly installed as a NSW delegate - to proceed to the vote for a chairman.

He then adjourned the board meeting to give Queensland seven days to choose a replacement for Jackman, with a further 14-day nomination period as required.

QRU chairman Peter Lewis, one of the architects behind a campaign to radically overhaul the ARU, was fuming last night about the political manoeuvring. He let slip the words "it's a disgrace" before announcing he would be making no statement before a press conference in Brisbane this morning.

The machiavellian machinations pushed into the background the announcement earlier in the day that, as expected, the ARU had accepted Flowers' resignation, to take effect from May 11.

Flowers had intended to see out the remaining eight months of his contract but it had become apparent he was seen as a lame-duck administrator at a time when the ARU desperately needed a fresh face to restore confidence in the leadership of the game.

"I was committed to overseeing an orderly transition," said Flowers. "However, I no longer consider that smooth transition to be possible. While it is disappointing, I believe it is in the best interests of the game and for me personally."

However, the board asked him to stay on until after the upcoming International Rugby Board meeting, at which several critical issues will be discussed, including law changes, the steadily increasing recruitment of southern hemisphere stars by European clubs and Melbourne's bid for the 2009 sevens World Cup.

"My fervent hope now is that the rugby community gets behind the new chairman and my successor," Flowers said.

The rugby community will have to wait for both, and at a time when morale in the code has plummeted to the same depths being plumbed on the Super 14 ladder by the Reds and Waratahs.

It remains to be seen whether NSW's desertion of Jackman triggers a like response by Queensland, which had supported the election of NSWRU boss Petersen as ARU chairman.

The political shenanigans have also pushed back by at least a month any decision on Flowers' replacement. O'Neill continues to gather support but some board members argue that at a time of uncertainty in Australian rugby, what is needed is a head who will bring all parties together, not potentially further divide them.