Eszter Vajda, the UNC-TV reporter whose 53-minute documentary The Alcoa Story and three "North Carolina Now" segments about the aluminum giant's efforts to seize another 50 years of control over a 38-mile stretch of the Yadkin River set off a firestorm of controversy after the footage was subpoenaed by the NC Senate Judiciary II Committee last month,was fired by the public broadcasting station this afternoon.
Gail Zimmerman, associate general manager of UNC-TV, said it was a personnel matter and declined comment.
More updates to follow.
2 comments:
Who do they think they are fooling? I think this all will come out in court. I hope she sues them for wrongful termination.
If you read the emails, she was asking for it. She was neglecting covering the legislature to do the Alcoa shoots, and taking photogs from the legislative coverage. She schemed with her cohorts - Richard Morgan, Carter Wrenn, Roger Dick, Bruce Johnson, and Martin Sansone - to get pressure put on her superiors who weren't going along with what she wanted - Eszter rules! In a prophetic email to the Yadkin Riverkeeper, she said she was putting everything on the line, including her job. Inflated egos, with no ethical standards whatsoever, certainly not journalistic standards, were running rampant. What's disturbing is that no commercial news organization would ever have gone anywhere near as far as she did. Public TV seems to have been vulnerable, and was surely bullied and manipulated by elected officials in a way no commercial news organization would ever be.
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