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The headquarters of the Funke Media Group in Essen
Photo: Marcel Kusch / dpa
The Funke Media Group announces its membership in the Federal Association of Digital Publishers and Newspaper Publishers (BDZV).
This emerges from a letter from Funke Managing Director Christoph Rüth to the Vice President of the BDZV, reports the industry service “Media Insider”.
The manager justifies the resignation with the loss of trust in the publishers to initiate comprehensive reforms.
The Funke Group had previously submitted proposals for a "modernization" of the association.
However, these were met with rejection, as the Vice Presidents recently emphasized once again to publisher Julia Becker.
The resignation is also a reaction to the Vice Presidents' recent offer to include Julia Becker in the Executive Committee.
Rüth writes: "We want to counter the speculation about the power struggle in the BDZV with a clear signal and draw attention to the core of our discussion."
Julia Becker, publisher of the Funke Group, called for the resignation of publisher President Mathias Döpfner with Funke last week.
Funke had already threatened to leave the association at a BDZV meeting in February.
Funke is the third largest publishing group in Germany.
In addition, it has been speculated by publishers and observers that Becker could use the reform and a proposed merger with the magazine association VDZ to put himself at the helm of this new organization.
Vice President Thomas Düffert recently resigned from office.
The CEO of the Madsack Media Group did not give any specific reasons in his resignation announcement.
In fact, the step is likely to have something to do with the latest revelations about BDZV President and Axel Springer boss Mathias Döpfner.
According to research by the "Financial Times", he is said to have delayed the investigations against the former "Bild" editor-in-chief Julian Reichelt in his own house - and even to have made counter-investigations into alleged people behind the scenes.
Reichelt had to undergo an internal investigation for alleged abuse of power against several employees and ultimately lost his job.
cpa