Johannesburg - Andrew Walker, the highly respected and much loved executive editor of The Star, died on Tuesday night. He was 58 years old.
He had fought a long, hard battle with cancer with a stoic courage and dignity that won him a whole new generation of admirers.
A lifer with the Independent Group and a legendary news editor in the media industry, Walker joined the Bulawayo office of The Rhodesian Printing and Publishing Company as a 17 year old cub reporter – after first spending an intense year with the elite Rhodesian Light Infantry.
After completing his six month cadet course, Walker spent the next four years honing his skills on the Bulawayo Chronicle and becoming an officer in the territorial Rhodesia Regiment before transferring to The Star, the flagship of the holding Argus Printing and Publishing company, in 1980.
His rise on the paper was fast, being selected in 1984 for a much sought after two year secondment to the Argus company’s New York office. His stay in the US was cut short by a year for cost cutting measures and he returned to The Star in 1985 where he was made special writer before becoming deputy news editor under legendary Star news editor Peter Mann.
He succeeded Mann as news editor in 1988 and then again five years later as night editor before becoming managing editor of the paper. He left The Star at the beginning of 2000 to become deputy editor of Independent News Network, an in house editorial synergy unit co-ordinating the content of 18 newspapers across five cities over seven days.
His success in helping to set up this unit was rewarded by his appointment as deputy editor of the Sunday Independent in 2002 and, then in 2009, with his appointment as group editorial content coordinator. He returned to The Star in his final deployment as executive editor, responsible for the afternoon edition of the paper.
Mann, the chief executive of one of the biggest public relations firms in Africa, on Tuesday remembered Walker as one of the finest newspapermen he had ever had the privilege to work with.
“I was fantastically lucky to have him. Andy deserved the job far more.
“We worked together during one of the toughest times ever in South African journalism – the death throes of apartheid.”
Peter Sullivan, a former editor of The Star, wrote to Walker on the anniversary of his 25 years with the company in 2000: “You know the story I always tell about you is that when you were on duty, the editor could sleep peacefully at night. You have a talent for meticulousness coupled with imagination, a combination devoutly sought, but seldom found. At The Star you did the toughest of jobs from News Editor to Night Editor and you were a star at both.”
On Tuesday night, the editor of The Star Japhet Ncube said: “I am very saddened to hear of Andy’s death, he was an absolute gentleman and a total professional, I am gutted by the loss as we all are. Our thoughts are with his family.”
Walker is survived by his partner Joy Immelman, his father David, a former assistant editor of The Star, his mother, his two sisters and their families.
Independent Media