News Corp Australian chief quits amid review
Departure of company veteran seen as political decision before elections in September
News Corp's Australia chief, Kim Williams, resigned from the company as editor-in-chief Col Allan reviews its newspapers in the country amid pre-election clashes with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
Clarke retired in 2007 as chairman of the Herald and Weekly Times, a News Corp unit that publishes the country's biggest-selling newspaper, Melbourne's .
Allan would be "providing extra editorial leadership" to News Corp's Australian papers for two to three months, according to an internal e-mail from group chief executive Robert Thomson.
Murdoch was seeking to "get rid of" Australia's government in a September 7 election, Rudd said this week after Sydney's best-selling urged readers to "kick this mob out" in a front-page editorial on Monday.
"It certainly appears to be a very political decision," said Angus Gluskie, the managing director of White Funds Management. "It certainly seems as though Murdoch wants a particular viewpoint expressed, and that's got a number of issues. It's right at the heart of the independence of the press."
Williams felt "now is the right moment to leave", Thomson said in yesterday's statement announcing his departure.
Stephen Browning, a spokesman for News Corp Australia, declined to comment further on the reasons for his departure.
Clarke "is an experienced executive with a unique understanding of our company's culture", Murdoch said in a separate statement. He had "the immense energy and clarity of vision necessary to drive our properties forward at this challenging time".
News Corp Australia runs newspapers including the , and the country's sole national general-interest broadsheet, . It also has a 50 per cent stake in pay-television company Foxtel alongside Telstra, giving it what Australia's antitrust regulator calls a near-monopoly on subscription television.