Marc Walder parts ways with head of department Klaus Zaugg

The new organization at Ringier Verlag Zeitungen is having its first effects: The new editorial director Marc Walder is parting ways with 50-year-old Klaus Zaugg, a distinguished Swiss sports journalist, with immediate effect. His successor as head of the ice hockey section of the joint Blick and SonntagsBlick sports editorial team is 40-year-old Dino Kessler (photo). He has been working for the Blick sports editorial team since June 2005. Prior to that, he was an ice hockey professional and player for the Swiss national team, and took part in various world championships. According to an internal Ringier press release, Walder and Zaugg had held intensive discussions and realized that they had different views on the journalistic direction of the sports editorial team. "Klaus Zaugg is not a tabloid journalist by nature. Our discussions have shown that he sees himself first and foremost as an author, and that he would therefore like to return to what are known as long journalistic stretches. This was our main discrepancy," Walder is quoted as saying on the employee portal. Walder's answer to the following question is rather evasive: "Klaus Zaugg is considered to have an idiosyncratic personality. Were there any difficulties in this area?". In his answer, the Sonntagsblick editor-in-chief pointed out that he had brought Zaugg to the Blick and Sonntagsblick sports editorial team eleven years ago and held him in high regard as a journalist and a person of integrity. They parted on good terms.