KUALA LUMPUR: The New Straits Times Press (Malaysia) Berhad (NSTP) today announced the appointment of three group editors for each of its publication; the New Straits Times (NST), Berita Harian (BH) and Harian Metro (HM), following a manpower rationalisation exercise.
In a statement by Media Prima Bhd (Media Prima), Ahmad Lokman Mansor has been appointed as NST's group editor effective Jan 1. Saidon Idris is BH's new group editor effective the same date.
Husain Jahit will hold the same post for HM effective March 16, this year.
Lokman, who holds a Bachelor of Arts in Mass Communication and Media Studies from the University of Toledo in Ohio, started his stint with NSTP in April 1993 as a reporter for the Business Times.
He went on to eventually become the section's Deputy Editor.
Among his experience include being appointed New Media Editor in June 2009, and Associate Editor of Opinion Leaders (Op-Ed) in Nov 2012, where he managed and planned the editorial and commentary pages of the newspaper on a daily basis.
Other key positions that he held include as Associate Editor of Current Affairs and Digital between 2015 and 2016, Associate Editor of Business, Op-Ed and Cars, Bikes and Trucks (2016-2018) and Convergence Editor of Business (2018-2019).
He was also promoted to Executive Editor of Business, Op-Ed and Digital of the NST early last year.
Meanwhile, Saidon has been instrumental in BH’s news gathering operations, specifically in Economics and Current Affairs.
He was an economics graduate from the Universiti of Malaya and joined NSTP in 1997 as a senior writer for Dataniaga, a business magazine published by the group.
A year later, Saidon was transferred to BH’s news desk.
In 2003, he was promoted as the newspaper’s Assistant Economics Editor, before assuming the post of Economics Editor in 2004.
In January 2014, he was appointed as BH Associate Editor, Current Affairs, overseeing the features, economics and foreign desk as well as writing Op-Ed for the newspaper.
Saidon was then promoted as BH Senior Specialist Writer, Economics and Current Affairs in 2015.
In January 2018, he was made the Senior Executive Editor, Convergence, NSTP and a year later became a Senior Executive Editor for BH.
For HM, Husain started his career at NSTP in January 1990 as a marketing assistant at Beriteks, a teletext service introduced by TV3 in 1985.
He holds a Diploma in Computer Science (Programming) from Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM).
In 1996, Husain then honed his skills as an information technology or online journalist with BH for a total of 10 years, before joining HM as an IT or online journalist in 2007.
Husain was later promoted as the newspaper’s Editor for Business and Information Technology (IT) before being made the Associate Editor for Features.
In February last year, he was appointed as the newspaper's Executive Editor (commercial).
Among Husain’s achievements in journalism include receiving the Gold Award in Best Greentech Journalism under the Energy, Green Technology and Water Ministry in 2012, and a second place for IT News Reporting in Bahasa by Sony Malaysia 2011.
Media Prima executive director (news and editorial operations) cum NSTP interim chief executive officer Mustapha Kamil Mohd Janor said their appointments are clearly a testament to the Group’s internal succession planning.
“We strongly believe in grooming talent from within the company. This also reflects our strong desire to strengthen NSTP’s position as the news and content provider of choice in the face of a challenging business environment.”
Media Prima Group announced its rationalisation exercise on Nov 1, last year. NSTP is a subsidiary of Media Prima.