The sacking of some 40 journalists and other non-editorial staff by The Sun management today was described by the National Union of Journalist (NUJ) as a "union-busting" exercise.

According to NUJ president Norila Mohd Daud, the retrenchment which saw the termination of six out of 10 key NUJ-Sun branch officials was unprecedented.

"In my history of 17 years in the union, this is first time that it is this bad," Norila said.

She was speaking to journalists at an emergency press conference at the NUJ office in Kuala Lumpur shortly after meeting with representatives from The Sun's branch of the union.

Norila regretted that The Sun management failed to stick to the decision agreed upon at a meeting with the union on Monday.

The meeting resulted in the union calling for a one-week "cooling-off" period after the management vowed to re-examine its decision to withdraw the promised bonuses to the staff.

"We are taken aback that the management did not abide to this decision and respect the agreement," she said.

Over the past two weeks, Sun journalists have staged several pickets to protest against the suspension of two colleagues and the company's delay of a one-month bonus which was due to be paid by the end of last month.

The company also owes its staff another month's bonus which is supposed to be made over a three-month instalment starting February.

The suspensions of two Sun journalists followed a controversial Christmas day front-page report of a plot to kill the country's top two leaders.

The report was picked up by news agencies and circulated worldwide. This irked Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad who criticised the daily for "sensationalist reporting".

Legal advice

Norila also said the union will be seeking advice from its lawyer tomorrow before deciding on its next course of action.

According to her, The Sun has not consulted the union before carrying out the mass layoffs.

She urged the management to suspend the retrenchment exercise until it has completed its negotiations with the union.

NUJ-Sun branch chairman K Kannan (right), who was also present at the press conference, said he was not sure how many staff were affected by the retrenchment exercise.

"I do not know for sure how many are retrenched," he said, adding that some of the staff who were on leave received their retrenchment letters at home.

Kannan said the majority of those retrenched are editorial staff, adding that about 20 full-time reporters were retrenched today while the rest were photographers, graphic designers and sub-editors.

The newspaper has an editorial staff of about 100, plus another 50 journalists stationed in various bureaus nationwide.

'Price for loyalty'

The affected staff were called into the office this evening and given their retrenchment letters effective immediately.

Kannan said the majority of those retrenched were members of the union, most of them have been working for The Sun for many years.

"This is the price they pay for loyalty," he said.

Kannan added that the retrenched staff were only offered very basic benefits.

The Sun, an English-language daily launched in 1994, has a total 430 employees, 125 of whom are NUJ members.