Daryll Cullinan, who withdrew from the South African team following a pay row, has been suspended from provincial cricket pending an inquiry. Mthuthuzeli Nyoka, chairman of Cullinan's province Gauteng, said he decided to launch the inquiry after being contacted by the United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCB) and Minister of Sport Ngconde Balfour.

Cullinan placed his international career in jeopardy when he pulled out of the second Test at Cape Town beginning on Friday. In a statement, Cullinan expressed that he had wished "to be treated in a manner equal to the other senior players", but that the UCB had given him no indication as to what match fees, if any, he would be paid.

Nyoka pointed out Cullinan has not been "pre-judged" and said the role of the inquiry was to get to the bottom of the matter.

"What happened was that the CEO of the UCB, Gerald Majola, gave me a full report on what had happened and said he was seriously concerned about one of my players," commented Nyoka.

"The Minister of Sport is also quite upset and his ministry has expressed its concern. Naturally, we are also concerned.

"Because of the serious nature of the matter, we decided we had to look into it."

The commission of inquiry will be headed by the GCB's vice chairman, Judge Mohammed Jajbhay.

"Daryll is a hero to so many people," said Nyoka. "He's a hero to me. We certainly don't want to pre-judge him. That he has been suspended does not mean that. We simply thought that we don't want anything to get in the way of the commission's work. Hopefully then we'll be able to end the commission by as early as next week."

Cullinan, who has a career average of 44.21 after 70 Tests, was South Africa's most successful batsman last year in the West Indies, but lost his UCB contract when he decided to turn out for English county Kent.

An injury picked up in England prevented him from being considered for the home series against India earlier this summer.

Gauteng have two Supersport Shield games still to play this season.

© Wisden CricInfo Ltd