NEW EDITORS are to take over at three of France's leading centre-left publications, with journalists at Le Mondedue to vote today on the owners' nominee to lead the influential daily.
Editorial staff at Libérationthis week approved the appointment of 39-year-old Nicolas Demorand as the paper's youngest-ever editor, while the man he replaces – Laurent Joffrin – is to take the helm at the weekly news magazine Le Nouvel Observateur.
The trio of investors who took charge of Le Mondelast year have chosen Erik Izraelewicz from a list of 13 candidates for the post of editorial director but the appointment requires the approval of at least 60 per cent of the paper's journalists in today's vote. Mr Izraelewicz (56), an economics specialist, has been editor of Les Echosand La Tribuneand previously held the post of editor-in-chief at Le Monde.
Le Mondehas been going through an acrimonious transition since the €110 million takeover by businessmen Pierre Bergé, Xavier Niel and Matthieu Pigasse last summer. Editorial director Eric Fottorino was sacked over differences revealed in a leaked e-mail in which he accused the new regime of "psychological abuse", while senior staff pinned an angry petition to Mr Fottorino's door after he wrote a long article disowning previous editorial stances and detailing where he believed the paper had gone wrong.
The journalists’ representatives on the selection committee to choose Mr Fottorino’s successor withdrew last month amid disagreements over how it was being run. But under the terms of a deal with the new owners, journalists retain their cherished veto over the new editor’s appointment.
Today's staff vote at Le Mondecomes days after journalists at Libérationvoted by 57 per cent to approve Mr Demorand's appointment as editor.
Both Le Mondeand Libérationhave been badly hit by declining sales and advertising. Le Monde's circulation, at 320,000, has fallen by about 25 per cent in a decade, and the prestigious title was close to bankruptcy before last summer's takeover.
A tumultuous decade for Libération was marked by cutbacks, redundancies, strikes and a dispute between owners and management. Laurent Joffrin arrived as editor in 2006 and is credited with internally stabilising the paper, although sales have fallen from 174,000 paid-for copies in 2001 to about 140,000 today. Next month Mr Joffrin will become editor of Le Nouvel Observateur– the job he left five years ago.