|
 UPDATE: Lynx officially strips FP7 Doha of awards: full story here.
A minor political outcry has emerged in Lebanon over one of the winning ads by Fortune Promoseven Doha, featuring Jesus taking a picture of a group of nuns, as the general outrage and anger over the agency’s Lynx win last week continues to rumble on.
Posts on Lebanese-Forces.com site, first condemn the work
(with a TV broadcast
on OTV along the same lines), then repeat an offical statement
from Samsung's Lebanese agent saying neither it nor Samsung had anything to do with the ads.
Samsung is now working to further damp down the outcry caused by the ad, which we understand was never seen or approved by Samsung.
Dubai Lynx itself has launched an investigation into large portions of FP7 Doha’s winning work, following complaints and protests from other agencies, and now, it seems, clients.
An official decision on the ads –and so the awards – is not expected until next week, but it seems highly likely that much, if not all of the Samsung work will be pulled, given the row that has emerged in its wake.
In a separate development, AdNation understands FP7 may be pulling some of its winning work itself, specifically the Higeen ad featuring a pig.
Wow, Jesus and a pig in ads in the Middle East – whoever would have thought it might be controversial...?
Frankly, though, there’s little humour to be found in any aspect of this situation. When awards organisers and winning agencies are arguing over who gets to pull which bit of work, while a “client” that never was tries to salve political outrage over work it never commissioned, this is not good.
The phrase that comes to mind, in fact, is “unholy mess”.
UPDATE 14:10: Fortune Promoseven has launched its own investigation into the ongoing brouhaha over Doha's Lynx work, with FP7 Dubai CEO Azmi Yafi heading it up.
“Yes, we are prepared to take decisive action regarding any submission by FP7 Doha which genuinely contravenes the rules, regulations and the spirit of Lynx,” said Yafi in a press release.
“This is not just about winning or losing at Lynx. This is about ethics, and practices, and about Promoseven’s responsibility towards our industry,” he added. “We are looking into the allegations and if we have discrepancies from our end, we will take immediate and swift action to remedy them.”
Tom Roychoudhury, head of corporate communications at MCN, FP7's parent company, said FP7 was working closely with the Lynx organisers to resolve the problems. The agency expects to release an official statement along with Lynx early next week.
“We want to make sure that the sanctity and prestige of the Lynx Awards as the beacon of creative merit in our region is preserved,” said Roychoudhury in the release.
This is all to the good, but this is still an investigation after the fact - and it seems like the genie is well out of the bottle at this stage.
UPDATE 14:20: Over on the Campaign Middle East blog, "John Doh" is posting his usual informative information, including two links to Tayyar.org, one a 12-page thread
arguing about the whole sorry mess in Lebanon, and another an English version of the Catholic rebuke
to the paper that published the ads.
(We're not getting in to the politics of this, on the basis that it's all a complete fiction, and the sooner everyone in Lebanon stops arguing about it the better.)
Also Anubis posts to say he will be adding YET MORE scam work to his blog, but this time from other agencies. Which should be interesting...
No one is coming out of this well.
|
News 
