Blocked: The reappointment of the chief executive at Le Monde
PARIS: Journalists at Le Monde have rejected a bid by the chief executive, Jean-Marie Colombani, to renew his mandate, leaving uncertainty about who would lead the French newspaper.
Because Colombani was the only candidate, the vote late Tuesday blocking his appointment added a dose of uncertainty to a board meeting scheduled for Friday to name a chairman.
Colombani, a widely read editorial writer, has worked at Le Monde since 1977 and led the paper as chairman since 1994. The new appointment would have been his third six-year term.
Another French media organization, the private broadcaster TF1, also became a subject of news coverage this week after it hired a senior member of the campaign team of the newly elected president of France, Nicolas Sarkozy.
Laurent Solly, deputy director of the Sarkozy campaign, will join the broadcaster in mid-June as a deputy director general. The appointment has served to fuel accusations of excessively close association between Sarkozy and the owners of major French media.
For example, immediately after his election, Sarkozy retreated to a large private yacht loaned to him by the media financier Vincent BollorŠ¹.
At Le Monde, the journalists, who hold veto power over the appointment of a chairman, expressed dismay at changes within Le Monde during the Colombani tenure.
Like other major French newspapers, Le Monde has faced a drop in circulation, and losses at the paper have been projected to reach \40 million, or $54 million, by 2008.
Colombanis response was to make investments and partnerships with other publications, using a hard-charging style that antagonized many at the newspaper.
“Le Monde has not only changed size, but it has changed its nature,” Robert SolŠ¹, a Le Monde journalist critical of Colombani, wrote in a message to colleagues. “We were a newspaper, but we have become a media group.”
From a business perspective, Colombani has become a victim of his own success, wrote Claude Perdriel, the founder and chief executive of the weekly news magazine Nouvel Observateur.
“When Jean-Marie Colombani took over the newspaper 12 years ago with Alain Minc, the title was failing and should have fallen into the hands of an industrial group,” said Perdriel, whose publication has a shareholding link with Le Monde.
“He created a group, but above all he did that while maintaining a structure that left important decisions in the hands of the employees,” Perdriel said.
