Errol Simper writes:
The humble scribe would suggest the truth is the last four years haven't been all that great for the PNG-born Max Robert Uechtritz. He has, at least for the time being, had his fill of everyone's ABC. Yes, Uechtritz is sad to leave. Equally, his valedictory will be softened via a very real relief.

A tall, likeable man with large, capable hands that could belong to a carpenter, he has found occupying the top rung of the corporation's news and current affairs ladder to be extremely wearing. Uechtritz has had enough of juggling ever-decreasing financial resources and cuts to program budgets. He has had his fill of ideologically driven, often media-naive, carping from certain individuals in the boardroom. Despite an immense regard for Balding and an underlying affection for some of his fellow directors, Uechtritz is sick and tired of internal politics and turf wars. He has had enough of tension-charged meetings. He was wearied by the public attacks from the former minister for communications, Richard Alston, after Uechtritz's much-discussed suggestion that military spokespeople can be ‘lying bastards’. He has long been tired of Alston's persistent, if mistaken, complaints that the ABC's Iraq war coverage was biased against the US.

It isn't that Uechtritz has found the ABC unsupportive as some of this politics has spewed forth. He simply resents the amount of time and mental energy he has been forced to expend on matters he privately regards as misguided, insubstantial nonsense.

Uechtritz, once a ‘hard’ news specialist – well-regarded by numerous peers – found himself more of a bureaucrat than he wanted to be. Having about $125 million and close to 700 news-gatherers to play with could easily metamorphose into endless tensions and conflict about production resources, schedules, money, about the place and priority news and current affairs should be accorded.

Thus everyone has been telling the truth, give or take a few millimetres, about Uechtritz's departure. There's no sensation, no flaming row, no one great issue, no proverbial last straw. It has been an accumulation of irritations and frustration. Case-hardened Uechtritz predecessors, such as Peter Manning and Paul Williams, would probably fall into an immediate empathy with what the scribe is here alleging.

Should even a skerrick of this idle speculation be correct and Uechtritz does leave with relief, the sadness is also genuine. Uechtritz sincerely believes in the importance of the ABC's independence and its value to the broadcasting spectrum and community life. He rebuffed Nine's first approach, late last year, saying he was committed to the national broadcaster. He meant it. But the approach, from Nine's director of news and current affairs, Jim Rudder, planted a seed. Uechtritz later met PBL's media director, John Alexander, and Nine's deputy chief executive, David Gyngell. Nine began to emerge as A Good Place. Lunch with Kerry Packer clinched it.

Insofar as can be ascertained, the broad internal judgment about Uechtritz's tenure is that "he did a good job". There may be Uechtritz-haters but they're not easily identifiable. They certainly haven't been blocking off the scribe's telephone line for long periods with bitter criticism.

Whether or not he ever returns to the ABC, Uechtritz seems destined to be recorded as one of its more colourful identities. There was, of course, his televised punch-up at Robert Trimbole's 1987 funeral. His "lying bastards" utterance has been inculcated into Australia's modern media history. He played a solid part in Shier's downfall. He may also come to be remembered as the director of news and current affairs who, despite gentle hints from Shier, never got around to firing Kerry O'Brien.

The Australian 29apr04