CAIRO: Egypt’s Consumer Protection Authority (CPA) banned Tuesday a TV commercial about Fox Chips because it “incites violence against children,” while another advert sparked criticism among women rights defenders over “inciting harassment.”
The CPA chairperson Atef Yacoub said in a statement that the Fox chips commercial violates pedagogical principles on parents’ treatment of their children. The advert shows a young man telling his father he predicts the future when he eats Fox Chips. The father slapped his son, asking if he had predicted the move.
According to the CPA statement, the board of directors decided to ban the advert after receiving a number of complaints from citizens and the Ministry of Social Solidarity, saying the content of the advert violates the Advertisement Standards of 2005.
“The advert incites physical violence and hatred; it violates children’s rights and encourages parents to beat their children,” the statement read.
The advertizing company that produced the advert has been notified with the authority’s decision; satellite channels will be summoned to finalize the banning procedures, Yacoub said.
In case that TV channels did not apply the decision, the authority will file a legal complaint, he added.
Ramadan, the ninth month of the Islamic calendar where Muslims fast from dawn to dusk, is a season for companies to promote their products in commercials interrupting dozens of satellite operas soap and entertainment programs produced to be broadcast during the month.
Another commercial promoting Mousa Coast Red Sea resort was condemned by I Saw Harassment group, as Egyptian actor Amr Youssef “was visually and verbally harassing actresses in the advert in a clear reference to the commercial exploitation of crimes of sexual violence and the sexual harassment faced by women and girls.”
The group noted that Youssef previously appeared in an awareness campaign on violence against women.
A 2013 United Nations study found that 99.3 percent of Egyptian women have been sexually harassed, either verbally or physically. The plague has triggered several the founding of several women rights organizations, anti-harassment protests as well as new laws to deter perpetrators.