Monday, January 29, 2007

SCMP: more departures

Editor of the South China Morning Post, Fanny Fung has resigned. Number Two in the pecking order, she will be replaced effective 1 February 2007 by someone who was in the fifth editorial layer, C K Lau. Lau was Executive Editor, Policy.

Fung's departure is the fourth high-power resignation (or departure) in the last several months.

In October, a staff photographer took photos of the wrong person in a high-profile criminal court. After publication of one of the photos in the SCMP's Business Post, the SCMP was obliged to publish a large apology on the front page of the newspaper. The photographer was sacked, and staff were not happy about the sacking.

In November, two senior editors were sacked over a leaving page for sacked Sunday Post editor Niall Fraser. In the furore which followed, a third of the staff demanded the sackings be re-considered. To no avail.

In December,
business editor Stuart Jackson resigned in the wake of the photo debacle.

Now, Fung. Well, she has recently started to feature as one of the talking heads the BBC Worldservice phone when they need a local slant on current affairs hereabouts . . .

Mark Clifford continues as Editor-in-Chief.

For newer/previous posts about SCMP staff stuff, please click on scmp in Labels (below). Thank you.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

There is more dope on this in the Chinese-language media (Apple Daily). First, Fanny Fung was at The Standard and preceded Mark Clifford in moving to SCMP. Second, Fanny Fung left SCMP with one other person who left with her from The Standard to SCMP. You can read whatever you want into this. Third, the SCMP photographer who was sacked was not told whom he was supposed to be photographing on that day! Tough jog, isn't it?

Anonymous said...

It seems to be a Celtic situation. Could CK Lau be putting his "team" in place? Could Clifford be the next to go? Maybe next time the Kuoks hire an editor-in-chief, which seems to happen every few months, they might try a little due diligence to see if the person is starkers. Not like Cliffs is an unknown quantity.