The ad described African women’s hair as “damaged, dry and frizzle” while it labelled white women’s hair as “normal and flat.”
The country’s third largest political party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has since embarked on a nationwide shutdown of all the 800 Clicks stores throughout the country.
“We won’t tolerate any racism if these white people want to be racists they should go to Australia and leave South Africa.
All the Clicks stores will remain closed until Friday and that is if they agree to our demands. We are going to teach them a lesson since they love money. We want to see those people that are behind the advert to be suspended and for Clicks to cut all ties with all these racist institutions,” said Julius Malema, leader of the EFF.
However, Vikesh Ramsunder, CEO of Clicks has since apologized for the incident, “it took me seconds to realise how insensitive the advert was I don’t know how our employees missed this one. I am so disappointed with that. We are taking accountability on that and already two of our employees from the marketing department have been suspended.”
Already it’s alleged that two of Clicks’ outlets have been petrol bombed in the provinces of Gauteng and Mpumalanga. The company has also lost a court interdict against the EFF nationwide protests.
@danielItai_zw
