Jim Marett's final edition

POOR old Jim Marett, recently ousted group general manager of the Hong Kong Standard . The man who fought as a tunnel rat in the Vietnam war feels powerless to halt the inevitable tide of rumours swirling around his sudden departure from the key position, alongside that of his Hong Kong-born Australian wife, Linda To, the former marketing promotions chief.

Keeping Posted has learnt that genial Jim, credited with reversing the fortunes of the ailing newspaper, lost his job after failing to negotiate a new contract. His wife had held the advertising contract for the Standard through their company, Marett Communications, for several years in Melbourne before taking a full-time job with the paper.

When they moved to Hong Kong, his wife quite legitimately kept that contract, under the terms of which she received commission for placing adverts for the Standard. However, it seems a couple of directors were not aware of this and when informed of it were none too happy.

A pow-wow was held but no agreement was reached, so Jim cleaned out his office two Sundays ago when fewer former colleagues were around, permitting him a greater degree of dignity. Along with photographs of his sterling service in the Vietnam conflict he also took down a sign saying 'Newspaper Wars are easy'.

News of the shake-up was broken to staff in a rare and brief notice from group chairwoman, tycoon Sally Aw. Workers claim they are in the dark about it all, but Henrietta So, a Standard veteran of eight years, who takes over his job, murmured something about management restructuring, performance evaluation and contracts, when cornered by us.

Now Jim and Linda are contemplating their futures from their Clearwater Bay home. Still, he continues a grand tradition. The previous general manager, the rather more fiery Alan Armsden, left the paper rather suddenly just before Jim's arrival. There were rumours about that, too.