Von Grünigen's wife Verena Speck announced his death on Facebook on Sunday. He was 80 years old. The radio producer and journalist spent almost 40 years at Swiss Radio, where he was, among other things, head of entertainment and moderation.

In 1984, he took over as program director of DRS 1, and also headed the Zurich radio studio a year before his retirement. He is considered a radio legend and a Swiss radio veteran.

Von Grünigen has been active in health and development policy on an honorary basis. In 2011, the University of Zurich awarded him an honorary medical doctorate for his work as president of the Swiss Obesity Foundation. In doing so, the university recognized his services to development and educational work. In the laudation, it was said that he had dedicated himself to a major problem with extraordinary commitment.

From 2003 to 2010, Heinrich von Grünigen chaired the Board of Trustees of Terre des hommes Children's Aid. (SDA)

According to the jury, the program "Eco - Das Wirtschaftsmagazin" impresses with its careful content and imaginative use of visuals. "It encourages viewers to form well-founded opinions on complex economic issues."

The Zurich Radio Prize goes to the program "Hörpunkt: 100!" on DRS 2 by Bernard Senn and Barbara Basting. In the eyes of the jury, the Hörpunkt editorial team takes a keen interest in cultural discourse. The 100th edition of the six-hour special format, which dealt with the fascinating number 100 and the year 1912 in April 2012, is a particularly successful and highly original historical collage. It showed "clever and multi-faceted ways of captivating an audience with history-conscious creativity".

With these two decisions, the Board of Trustees of the Zurich Radio Foundation, chaired by President Ruth Halter-Schmid, followed the proposals of the jury of experts. The prize has been awarded for over forty years for exceptional broadcasts and to outstanding personalities in radio and television. This year, the jury had to assess over 50 radio and television productions of remarkable quality in terms of content and form. For the first time, these included Rhaeto-Romanic television broadcasts with German subtitles. The awards will be presented at a ceremony in Zurich on November 26, 2012. Guest speakers will be Professor Helmut Thoma, founder of RTL, and Rudolf Matter, Director of SRF.
 

Stefan Siegenthaler has been a presenter at Radio BE1 and Energy Bern for the past six years. Most recently, he was the afternoon voice of the early evening program.

Casanova responded to a complaint from the FDP. The party had taken exception to a report on Swiss radio DRS about its Federal Councillor Johann Schneider-Ammann. The ombudsman concludes that Schneider-Ammann was mistakenly held personally and solely responsible for the policy of the Federal Council as a whole. "I therefore find a violation of the principle of objectivity," Casanova writes in the final report.

The criticism is directed at a contribution in the "Rendez-vous" program of September 1. In it, the role of the economics minister in dealing with the Swiss franc crisis was highlighted. The day before, the Federal Council had approved a CHF 870 million aid package for the economy. Again two weeks earlier, Schneider-Ammann had held out the prospect of a package worth 2 billion francs. The report's introduction says: "...his (Schneider-Ammann's) announcements draw a less than clear line." Subsequently, statements of the FDP Federal Councilor are played, which he had made at three different media conferences.

Violation of due diligence

In a letter to the ombudsman's office in mid-September, the FDP complained that the article violated the duty of care. The accused Federal Councillor was not given the opportunity to comment, nor were third parties given a chance to speak in support of the thesis. The quotes were also taken out of context.

Lis Borner, editor-in-chief of Swiss Radio DRS, counters in a letter to the ombudsman's office: A federal councilor must be held accountable for his public statements. The report was "undoubtedly very critical of Federal Councillor Schneider-Ammann", but reflected the general perception at the time of broadcast.

In fact, all the media have criticized the Federal Council's policy as lacking a concept, Casanova writes. The fact that this was also critically analyzed by Radio DRS was "journalistically downright compelling. The ombudsman considers it inadmissible that the criticism is focused on a single member of the national government, although he "clearly" represented the opinion of the college. According to Casanova, however, the criticism would have been admissible if the article had been recognizable as a commentary.

The ombudsman's office mediates between the parties involved in complaints against SRG. Its report is only of a declaratory nature; it has no decision-making power or authority to issue directives. In a second step, however, complainants can appeal to the Independent Complaints Authority (UBI) of the Swiss Confederation. (SDA)

According to Robert Ruckstuhl, Head of Radio at SRF, DRS 3 will focus on newer, more current music in future, while DRS 1 will aim for "a broader spread": "Music from the 1960s to the modern era. However, we will play tracks from the 80s rather than the noughties," Ruckstuhl is quoted as saying in the newspaper Der Sonntag. He is convinced "that most people are musically socialized in their youth". A large proportion of DRS 1 listeners were born in the 1950s or earlier. This has to be taken into account. This will lead to an expansion of the repertoire. Chansons, canzoni and also German pop will be heard more often on DRS 1, while classic hits will continue to be part of the core business of DRS Musikwelle.

Not only the DRS music program will be gently renovated from November. According to Sonntag, information will also be slightly expanded. In future, a longer overview of the day's events will be offered from 4 p.m. onwards. Furthermore, important sports results will be announced immediately in the daily program.

Finally, the increasingly long traffic jam reports are to be packaged in a more original way. The aim is to "journalistically weight" the reports, "present them in a more comprehensible way" and generally "think more in terms of the user than the disseminator" when moderating. According to Ruckstuhl, several presenters are currently being piloted - tried and tested voices and those that are not yet known.
 

The 43-year-old presenter of "Echo der Zeit" studied history and philosophy in Basel and Paris, according to a statement. After an internship at the BBC World Service in London, he joined Swiss Radio DRS in 1994. He worked on the news and foreign desk, hosted "Echo der Zeit" and was France correspondent for the radio in Paris.
 

This was announced by Swiss Solidarity on Thursday, according to SDA. It will probably be more of a retirement, the Bernese is quoted in a media release. "And in the future, I would like to do more of what I feel like doing," the 63-year-old said. In the future, Jeanneret will take on a few more mandates for Swiss Solidarity.
 
The former radio journalist marked a key phase in Swiss Solidarity's development over the past 19 years, during which more than a billion Swiss francs in donations were collected. As early as summer 2009, Priska Spörri took over as Head of Communications and long-time employee Andreas Rüfenacht assumed the role of Delegate for German-speaking and Rhaeto-Romanic Switzerland.
 
The radio program "Glückskette aktuell" on Swiss Radio DRS 1 will be realized by Ladina Spiess in the new year. The radio journalist is thus devoting part of her work entirely to reporting on the foundation.