Sumo: Match-fixing cheats set to have salaries frozen+

TOKYO, Feb. 13 Kyodo - The Japan Sumo Association said on Sunday it will consider freezing the salaries of sumo elder Takenawa and juryo-division wrestlers Chiyohakuho and Kiyoseumi, each of whom have been incriminated in schemes to rig bouts.

The JSA, which originally had decided it would continue paying the three in a
board meeting last Wednesday, said it will now consider suspending their pay at
an emergency board meeting scheduled for Monday evening at Tokyo's Ryogoku
Kokugikan.
Takenawa, whose ring name was Kasuganishiki, Chiyohakuho and lower-tier
grappler Enatsukasa have all confessed to match fixing. Kiyoseumi has been
implicated in phone text messages he sent to Kasuganishiki. Wrestlers in the
lower ranks below juryo do not receive a salary.
''I think we should question whether to pay those who wreaked such havoc on the
sumo association. It sets a bad precedent for other wrestlers who are working
very hard,'' one JSA official was quoted by a sumo source as saying.
A special panel investigating the recent match-fixing scandal will present a
report at Monday night's meeting.
The panel is scheduled to meet earlier on Monday morning to discuss the outcome
of last week's probe of 92 people, including the 14 implicated in the biggest
scandal in sumo history, and consider the next steps in its investigation.
There were no new admissions of match fixing among those questioned in the top
two divisions of makuuchi and juryo.
Monday's report to the JSA by the investigative panel is not likely to be the
last.
The JSA board also appears unlikely to touch on what kind of punishments
Chiyohakuho and the others who have admitted involvement in schemes to rig
bouts will receive.
Next month's Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka has been called off due to
the scandal.
==Kyodo