Vodafone was (not) an instrument of the Egyptian revolution

MOBILE PHONE FLOGGER Vodafone has been criticised for playing up its role in the uprising in Egypt earlier this year that led to the resignation of president Mubarak.

The company, which was criticised at the time for allowing the government to control its voice and data communications, is the subject of a long four minute advertising video that not so subtly suggests that it put the idea of revolution into the heads of Egyptian citizens.

The video includes promotional statements like "We didn't send people to the streets, we didn't start the revolution... We only reminded Egyptians how powerful they are," which are displayed under footage of public demonstrations.

This sort of thing doesn't go down very well among political thinkers, and one blogger said that the sentiment and suggestions were so bad that he would be tempted to switch providers, if he was a Vodafone customer.

"If I were a Vodafone customer, I promise you I would've switched networks last night - after watching their latest commercial, coming from ad agency JWT (the company that produced the advert), where they are taking credit for the Egyptian revolution," wrote Mohamed El-Dahshan

"You read that right. Vodafone and JWT are telling us, in a 3:59 spot, that 'we're not trying to take credit for the revolution but really, we totally inspired it with our crappy ad from last year. You're welcome, Egypt.'"

Vodafone Egypt has been keen to distance itself from the video, however, and has said that it is the work of JWT alone and was not released with its approval.

"Vodafone Egypt denies responsibility for the video that circulated on social media channels including highlights of a Vodafone commercial. Hatem Dowidar, CEO of Vodafone Egypt, confirmed that the company does not have any connection to this video and had no prior knowledge of its production or posting on the Internet. He added that Vodafone Egypt is part of a global Company that has strict policies refraining associating the Brand name with any political or religious affairs of any country in which it operates," said the company in a statement posted on Twitter.

"Dowidar further clarified that this video was produced by JWT company for its internal use and not for public display, and he added that Vodafone has never used this video and is not responsible for its messages or claims."

A later message added that the video had been removed from JWTs pages and was slowly being eradicated from Youtube. µ