Edouard de Rothschild Proves Money Speaks Louder Than Words At Liberation And The Editor Of Paris Match Learns Embarrassing A Future Presidential Candidate In France Can Still Lose You Your Job

As everyone expected, it took Liberation’s management just one year to go through the investment, and when, like Oliver Twist, it asked its leading shareholder for “more” -- some €15 million more – he said “ok”, but there was a price – Serge July the one-time Maoist revolutionary who has led the paper since it was founded in 1973 had to go.

The newspaper’s staff still has an editorial veto over management’s decisions. Would they allow their beloved editor to be fired? In a front -page editorial they wrote, “For 33 years Serge July has been the guarantor of our editorial independence. Liberation has retained and must retain its freedom of expression” and pointing directly at M. de Rothschild it said “it is not the role of any shareholder to decide on editorial content or contributors.”

But what that editorial didn’t say was that the editor should stay. July had told the staff that he did not want to stand in the way of future financial contributions for the newspaper that was at bankruptcy’s door once again. And so it was the end of July’s tenure, and the de Rothschild management begins.

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Most analysts had thought It would only be a matter of time for all of this to happen. Coming from such opposite ends of the political stream July and de Rothschild did not hit it off, but even accepting that as a given, their relationship was really about as bad and as rude as it could get. It is said that de Rothschild could hardly get permission to walk in Liberation’s corridors let alone poke his fingers into how the paper was run. Something had to give.

de Rothschild still held the ace -- he had additional funds he could invest but this time there would be no promise that the editor could remain until 2012; this time the editor was out! And even former one-time Maoists and leftist journalists came to understand that in today’s capitalist world the one holding the money speaks louder than the one writing the stories.

In many ways this is all good news – hopefully Liberation can be saved. de Rothschild apparently is really interested in building up Liberation’s web site – young leftists may not necessarily read the newspaper but the web site is very popular. And the young proved a few weeks ago when they took to the streets for a week to defeat a government bill affecting job rights of the young, that they still have that very same spirit of the student rebellions in 1968 from which Liberation first came to life.

But across town, the unrelated firing this week of the editor of Paris Match causes some concern that de Rothschild might be carrying some unwelcome baggage with him to Liberation.

De Rothschild is very friendly with French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy – the two have taken vacations together – and Sarkozy is thought to be a leading contender in upcoming French Presidential elections. Last summer Paris Match published pictures of Sarkozy’s wife, Cecilia, hand-in-hand with a man who was not Sarkozy. The fact there had been a split in the Sarkozy family was not news, but the pictures brought new meaning to the story. (They have gotten back together).

Sarkozy was furious at the publication of the pictures and he complained to his friend, French tycoon Arnaud Lagardère who controls Hachette Filipacchi Medias (FHM) that in turn publishes Paris Match. Lagardère was said to be furious that he was not advised beforehand that the pictures were to be published. Apparently he attempted to move the editor, Alain Genestar, upstairs within the organization but Genestar turned down the “promotion”. This weekend the guillotine fell and Genestar was told he was out as editor and was now “director of publishing” apparently a job without any real functionality.

Paris Match staff are now threatening strike action. As far as the company is concerned its simply a matter of a disagreement between high company officials and the editor, and in such cases high company officials always win.

So, Sarkozy complained and an editor eventually lost his job. Even if Lagardère didn’t believe such pictures should have been printed (and why not? – possibly a violation of France’s strict privacy laws?) you cannot hide the fact those published pictures were a huge hit at the newsstand. Paris Match also published pictures of Prince Albert’s of Monaco’s mistress with whom he had an illegitimate daughter and the magazine was fined for breaking France’s privacy laws but there was no word that Lagardère thought Genestar should have lost his job for that.

And therefore the question gets asked that if de Rothschild and Sarkozy are also such buddies, and Sarkozy obviously is used to letting his publishing friends know when he doesn’t like something their publications have printed -- just what influence might Sarkozy have with de Rothschild over what Liberation writes, or doesn’t write? de Rothschild says his friendship with Sarkozy will have no play as to what is or is written at the newspaper, and maybe the staff having editorial control will ensure that, but it is a pity such a question needs to be raised in the first place.

French newspapers are still generally facing reader malaise, with the circulation of all nine French national newspapers just around 1.4 million. It has taken tycoons with deep pockets to bail out those titles that are surviving the best.

Aerospace tycoon Serge Dassault took control of the conservative Le Figaro in 2004. Several staff left at the time saying management told them there were certain business stories that were now off-limits. But Dassault has invested in the newspaper, spending €8 million on a relaunch, but it still loses money.

Lagadère took a 15% interest in Le Monde. It went through a relaunch in November accompanied by a €4 million media spend, but circulation still fell for the year by 3% to 320,704 and it lost €7 million. But there are signs of improvement -- for the first five months of this year sales declined by just 2.9% over the same period a year ago, compared to a 10.3% drop the year before.

This year’s figures have been helped by Le Monde’s breaking in April an old-fashioned political scandal that puts Sarkozy’s main political opponent -- prime minister Dominique de Villepin -- in a poor light while Sarkozy comes out of it smelling like a rose. Wonder how Lagardère feels about the editor of Le Monde?

The story deals with a probe that started in 2004 linking bribes to France’s 1991 sale of warships to Taiwan. An anonymous letter found its way to authorities that said Sarkozy received some of that money, and the media claimed that de Villepin and President Jacques Chirac ordered an investigation based on that letter. But the letter was found to be a phony, Sarkozy was in the clear, but de Villepin and Chirac were left under a cloud, accused of ordering the investigation in an attempt to undermine Sarkozy’s political ambitions.

A good story, it did wonders for Le Monde’s circulation, and Sarkozy’s poll numbers rose significantly as de Villepin’s sank. And it proved that the French, who rank near the bottom in Europe of spending time reading newspapers will buy a newspaper if there is a good enough story – on one day with a particularly revealing story of political intrigue Le Monde’s circulation soared 18.5% higher than for that same day a year ago.

So with the atmosphere heating up for the Presidential elections perhaps French newspapers have discovered a way to gain readership – keep coming up with the political dirt! It sells in France, too.