The Global Media Group began a collective dismissal process this Tuesday, which includes the departure of the entire management of Diário de Notícias, according to a statement from the group. In addition to the departure of three directors of the newspaper who had been hired by the previous executive committee, the collective dismissal covers 17 members of the group, including the administrative, marketing and editorial areas, totaling 20 people, according to a justification note that the Observador had access.
The statement from the company that owns DN says that “the Global Media Group today began the process of restructuring internal teams, which forced us to make a collective dismissal based on the very complicated financial situation that resulted from the management of the last few months, the impact of which was public ”.
This decision was taken two days before a general strike by journalists. “The restructuring process also resulted in the departure of the director of Diário de Notícias, José Júdice, as well as the rest of the management, to whom we would like to thank for their commitment. An opinion was requested from the Editorial Board on this topic”, the note also says.
In addition to José Júdice, the DN directors were Ana Cáceres Monteiro and Filipe Garcia. The team had been hired by José Paulo Fafe’s appointed executive committee, in an effort to restore the newspaper’s editorial and economic recovery, which led to the hiring of other reinforcements. The current executive committee considers that this “very strong commitment to strengthening the team”, with the addition of 11 people to the editorial team, did not result in an improvement in circulation results, having contributed to the degradation of the newspaper’s operational results, which were 1. 3 million euros at the end of 2023.
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The decision to eliminate 9 of the 11 jobs created is thus justified, opting to keep two of the lowest paid people. In other words, the collective dismissal that affects DN journalists is based on the decision to eliminate the six most expensive jobs. In the case of the three directors, the administration invokes the termination of the employment contracts during the six-month trial period.
Reinforcements for the DN editorial team were hired at the end of last summer, and shortly afterwards the group went through a difficult situation that culminated in non-payment of salaries.
Global Media administrators say they are “aware that this process has a major impact on the operations of Diário de Notícias” and guarantee that they will do “everything” to “minimize its consequences”. But, they add, the “truth is that the current situation was unsustainable both from a financial point of view and from the point of view of equity with the professionals who have kept the editorial flame of Diário de Notícias alive for a long time. That is why this decision was necessary, which also aims to launch a renewed project for the DN that will be developed in deep coordination with the current editorial team”, he also says.
In addition to the wording of the DN, the collective dismissal also covers employees hired by the previous executive committee for advisory positions, administration support, financial control, secretarial services and a driver. The new general director also leaves.
The majority of people affected by this dismissal had been hired following the change in control of Global Media, which involved the entry of the World Opportunity fund and the management of José Paulo Fafe. The removal of this shareholder from the group’s management was completed in February, following an agreement with the other shareholders, including Marco Galinha.
The new director of Diário de Notícias will be Bruno Contreiras Mateus, current director of Dinheiro Vivo. The journalist will remain in his role for three months, until July, after which he will leave Global Media “to dedicate himself to personal projects, teaching and research”.
These hires at Diário de Notícias were made shortly before the previous management announced the dismissal of 150 to 200 workers from the group, an action that would further penalize Jornal de Notícias, TSF and Jogo. Shortly after this intention became known, the group failed to pay salaries.
Following the serious crisis that the Global Media group has gone through in recent months, the company has undergone a profound restructuring in recent weeks.
A group of businessmen from the north of the country came together to buy Jornal de Notícias, O Jogo and TSF, which will remain in a new company that should be led by journalist Domingos Andrade and which also includes the shareholders of Global Media.
“Piratinha do Ar” and former vice-rector of the Sanctuary of Fátima among the new administrators of Global Media
On the other hand, other titles, such as Diário de Notícias or Dinheiro Vivo, were not included in this operation — and remained within the sphere of the Global Media group, which has had new management since the end of February.
Vítor Coutinho, who was once a Catholic priest and vice-rector of the Sanctuary of Fátima, is the group’s new CEO. The administration also includes journalist Diogo Queiroz de Andrade and businessman Rui Rodrigues, known as the “Piratinha do Ar” for having hijacked a TAP plane as a teenager (a story that you can remember in an Observador Podcast Plus).
The statement from Global Media’s management includes an 11-page annex which describes in detail the reasons given for the collective dismissal.
Among the reasons are the crisis in the media, the decrease in the company’s activity, the financial imbalance and the results obtained by recent bets. According to the annex, there is a “lack of expected results from the recent structural reinforcement carried out” by the last administration.
“The inadequacy of this reinforcement of human resources in relation to the activity carried out, the Company’s results and the revenue generated is manifest, and the increase in the respective cost of salaries contributed greatly to the worsening of the Company’s economic and financial conditions”, says the note.
The “current macroeconomic circumstances”, the “market indicators for the coming years”, the “economic-financial indicators and their structural imbalance” are other factors.
In a statement, Diário de Notícias journalists said they “vehemently repudiate yet another announcement of collective dismissal at Global Media Group, which once again affects the heart of the newspaper and journalism”. Appealing for the survival of DN and “good journalism”, the newspaper’s editors say they hope that “the administration will reconsider and that it will be possible to create a solution that allows us to retain good professionals”. If this does not happen, alert to the possibility of professionals moving towards “new forms of struggle”.
For DN journalists, it is “incomprehensible that days before a general strike in the profession that defends better salary conditions, they intend to fire journalists invoking the criterion of ‘salary being too high’ and ‘salary equity in the company’”. The diary’s editors remind us that “naturally it cannot be expected that in just over three months, during which there were unpaid salaries [permanecendo o Subsídio de Natal ainda em falta]it was possible to witness a miraculous recovery.”
“The editorial team opposes yet another slimming down of DN, which for years has held the title of the smallest newsroom in the country [ou mesmo do Mundo] within the reference newspapers”, they also add, strongly criticizing the decision: “Firing journalists is giving up heritage, the only one of which the administration can and should be proud. Surviving collective dismissal after collective dismissal (it’s not building) is destroying good journalism and the resilience of those who have given up their lives to create a newspaper that lives up to the history and prestige of DN.”
*News updated at 00:17 on March 13th with the reaction of the Diário de Notícias editorial team