The city’s largest journalist group has said it will offer assistance to employees of Hong Kong newspaper Sky Post, which will soon publish its final print edition, lamenting the expected layoffs of experienced journalists — a move that it said would deal a blow to press freedom in Hong Kong.
In a statement on Friday morning, the Hong Kong Journalists Association said that it had become increasingly difficult for media organisations to operate, commercially, and under the state of press freedom in Hong Kong.
The association’s statement came after Sky Post, one of Hong Kong’s free Chinese-language newspapers, announced it would halt publication of its print edition next month as it focuses on online content.
Sky Post made the announcement in a Facebook post in Chinese on Wednesday. According to local media reports, Sky Post held a 10-minute staff meeting were staff were reportedly told the paper’s human resources department would meet employees one by one to discuss compensation.
Most of the staff would be dismissed, according to another report.
According to the 2022/2023 annual report of Sky Post’s parent company the Hong Kong Economic Times Group, the group was facing a loss of HK$5.8 million.
Declining press freedom
In its Chinese-language statement on Friday, HKJA said Sky Post employees would be welcome to seek assistance from the association.
“Colleagues from Sky Post can get in touch with the association, if needed, and we will do our best to provide assistance as we have always done,” the statement read. If they were members of the association, they could also apply for unemployment relief.
“Currently, many colleagues are facing the threat of layoffs and reductions in salary and benefits. Journalists who are passionate about their work are forced to give up their ideals over livelihood issues,” the statement continued.
The association also said it was concerned that the loss of experienced journalists would lead to a reduction in quality journalism, one of the reasons for the state of declining press freedom.
“Our association hopes that the operators and management of major media organisations will take into account the negative ramifications of brain drain within the industry while considering costs,” the association’s statement read.
It also called on media organisations to “make every effort to retain talent,” and to notify the association if they had any job vacancies.
Hong Kong has plummeted in international press freedom indices since the onset of the security law. Watchdogs cite the arrest of journalists, raids on newsrooms and the closure of around 10 media outlets including Apple Daily, Stand News and Citizen News. Over 1,000 journalists have lost their jobs, whilst many emigrated. Meanwhile, the city’s government-funded broadcaster RTHK has adopted new editorial guidelines, purged its archives and axed news and satirical shows.
In 2022, Chief Executive John Lee said press freedom was “in the pocket” of Hongkongers but that “nobody is above the law.” Lee, whose administration is mulling a “fake news” law, has told the press to “tell a good Hong Kong story.”
In August 2021, RTHK started to partner with China Media Group – the holding group for CCTV and China National Radio – to air more programmes to “nurture a stronger sense of patriotism” among viewers, a move condemned by the city’s journalists association as changing the city’s public broadcaster into “a propaganda mouthpiece”.
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