undoubtedly, Clarko would have been unwilling to "give evidence" without full details of the allegations made to the AFL (not those made in the HFC review) and without a commitment that the complainants could be cross-examined
and, there's overt, direct racism which Clarko/HFC may not be guilty of here, but there's also indirect, systemic racism where you set things up in a way that make it harder if you're not a whitefella, and you should know better (because everyone else does) but you don't really care