STANLEY Similo, the chief human resource, corporate and regulatory affairs officer at Leo, is the latest name to be linked to the position of chief executive officer at New Era newspaper.

Yesterday, The Namibian reported that the shortlist included Audrin Mathe, the chief news and programming officer at the NBC, and John Shigwedha, the manager: strategic communications at NamWater.

Stanley Shanapinda, CEO of the Communications Regulatory Authority of Namibia (CRAN), was erroneously listed as one of the candidates. Shanapinda's office yesterday said the Cran CEO had not applied for the position and neither was he on the shortlist.

Efforts to get comment from Similo were unsuccessful. He is on leave until next month.

Those close to the matter say Similo and Mathe were offered the job a month ago, but they declined it.

All three are former employees of the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation.

The Namibian understands that the parastatal is contemplating going back to the drawing board if they cannot appoint one of the three.

Some sources said the appointment was delayed because it needed approval by Cabinet, which held its last meeting of the year last week.

Other sources said New Era was not offering a sufficiently attractive pay package.

Board chairperson Ben Mulongeni could not be reached for comment yesterday.

New Era has been without a CEO since last year when Sylvester Black's contract expired. The newspaper also has been without an editor since founding editor Rajah Munamava bowed out in July. The news editor, Chrispin Inambao, has been serving as acting editor. Jeremy Cloete, who is the finance manager at the paper, is the acting CEO.