Staff of the Giornale del Popolo in Ticino continues to work
The journalists and the rest of the staff of the Giornale del Popolo in Ticino are not giving up. The newspaper will be published at least until Saturday, if not until Tuesday of next week.
The employees resumed work on Friday without pay or any guarantees. On Friday, the paper had appeared with almost empty pages and only a preface by the editor, Bishop Valerio Lazzeri, and a commentary by the editor-in-chief, Alessandra Zumthor.
Fundraising
Fundraising for the staff of the Catholic daily newspaper has begun among the people of Ticino. The goal is to save the paper.
Meanwhile, the Diocese of Lugano is facing accusations from various quarters that it has not made any efforts to safeguard the social situation of the paper's employees and has thus failed to fulfill its social responsibility. On Friday, the diocese announced in a communiqué that it would set up a solidarity fund for the employees following the district court's decision on the bankruptcy.
The president of the Ticino government, Claudio Zali, met the bishop of Ticino, Valerio Lazzeri, at noon on Friday for an orientation meeting to find out what room for maneuver might still be possible for intervention on the part of the authorities.
Interest at Lugano publishing house
Meanwhile, a Lugano-based publishing house, Fontana Print SA, expressed potential interest in continuing the paper in a different form. The head of the publishing house, Raoul Fontana, who specializes in the publication of magazines and books, told the news agency sda that they could at best imagine publishing the paper as a weekly newspaper, with a reduced staff.
"If the voice of the 'Giornale del Popolo' is missing in Ticino, all readers who feel close to the Catholic faith and the Church will lose something elementally important in their lives," Fontana said.
The publishers of the paper, which was founded in 1926, had to pull up stakes after the advertising marketing company Publicitas went bankrupt. An important part of the revenues came from advertising. On Thursday, the publishers announced that they had deposited the balance sheet. According to the information, the paper was to appear for the last time on Saturday (Werbewoche.ch reported). (SDA)
