Press Council reprimands Weltwoche - but case rightly taken up
Weltwoche and other media outlets were right to report on the foreign exchange transactions of Philipp Hildebrand, the former president of the Swiss National Bank. This is the conclusion reached by the Swiss Press Council. However, Weltwoche in particular made mistakes.
The media have fulfilled their role as "watchdogs of democracy" in the Hildebrand case. This was stated by the Swiss Press Council on Thursday at its annual media conference in Bern. This also applies to Weltwoche, whose revelations ultimately led to the resignation of the SNB president on January 9, 2012. For the Press Council, however, it is wrong to place the "blame" for the resignation on Weltwoche and its controversial reporting. Because: Regardless of the scope of the Hildebrand family's foreign exchange transactions, this event was of public interest, according to a statement by the Press Council.
From a professional ethics point of view, it was also positive that the media had questioned the "unusual" communiqué of the Bank Council of the Swiss National Bank of December 23, 2011. In the communiqué, the Bank Council had stated that rumors of unauthorized transactions by Hildebrand were groundless. Additional information was denied.
Complaint partially upheld
On the one hand, the Press Council dealt generally with the role of the media in the Hildebrand affair. On the other hand, the Council had to assess a complaint by Bank Sarasin against Weltwoche. The Press Council partially approved this complaint. In the assessment of the Press Council, Weltwoche violated the duty of truth because it did not name the main source of its information - the Thurgau lawyer Hermann Lei. In addition, it referred to the indirect source incorrectly - Hildebrand's client advisors instead of Bank Sarasin's IT staff. This incorrect information should have been corrected.
Weltwoche has to put up with another rebuke because it did not mark the published bank statements of Hildebrand as a "montage" - especially since the illustration proves the core of the criticism of Philipp Hildebrand. Weltwoche counters that the information content was not changed.
Weltwoche also violated its duty to be heard. The documents submitted to the Press Council show that Weltwoche did not seek a statement from Bank Sarasin, the bank affected by the data theft, until after the first series of articles had appeared. In addition, in order to verify the information from its source, Weltwoche should have confronted Bank Sarasin with the revelations anyway, the Press Council writes. Even if it had to expect that the bank would invoke banking secrecy and refuse to comment.
Regarding the source situation in the Hildebrand case, the Press Council states that Weltwoche was allowed to rely on the information it received about Hildebrand's bank account. The statements of the indirect source Lei were supported by the bank statement. In addition, there was a high level of public interest. According to the Press Council, the two-source rule, according to which unconfirmed information must be corroborated by at least two sources, cannot be applied schematically to every individual case.
Lack of distance
The Press Council also criticized the fact that Weltwoche's scandalizing choice of words ("brash crook," "speculator Hildebrand") was hardly supported by facts. The choice of words also indicated that the necessary distance between Weltwoche and the source of the information was lacking. However, the Press Council also suspects a lack of distance in other media. Because of its one-sided positioning in favor of Hildebrand, the Press Council raises the question of whether the Sunday press had allowed itself to be influenced by PR consultants or by circles close to the National Bank. Despite these shortcomings, however, readers were able to "understand and classify the role of the main exponents of the affair and how that of the media," writes the Press Council. (sda)
