Consumers petition UCC over misleading media adverts

Jinja. Consumers organisations have petitioned the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) over misleading adverts in the media.
The petition was on Wednesday handed over to UCC executive director Godfrey Mutabazi at Civil Service College in Jinja.
It was signed by eight advocacy groups including Uganda Consumer’s protection Association, Consumers Education Trust, Uganda Consumer Action Network, Uganda Information Technology Consumer Protection Association, I-Network Uganda, The Communication People’s Parliament of Uganda, ICT Association of Uganda and Women of Uganda Network under the theme: The media we want.

The consumers, through their petition presented by consumer activist Sam Watasa on Consumers Rights Day, said they are faced with an environment of false, harmful and misleading information which is delivered at ‘high speed on multiple frequencies’.
“The concerns of consumers lie in the realm of unethical conduct and content against what is clearly illegal practice, some messages on television and social media channels are outright disgusting to some people in the audience, but entertaining to others. The line between ethical and unethical practice has thus become very thin. This is especially where unethical broadcast practices and content is not clearly illegal,’’ the petition reads, in apart.

The consumers also complain about the use of children in advertising products and services yet such conduct is unethical, holding the broadcaster and advertiser responsible.
According to the petition, the false information spans all sectors of the economy ranging from religious fundamentalism deception, financial and social services sector, food and drugs where food supplements have been falsely advertised as medical drugs, fake products have been falsely positioned as ‘original’ to mean genuine and people in good health have been deliberately announced as dead especially on social media.

They also note that the products and services are advertised, promoted and presented as free when in actual sense, they carry under declared costs.
The consumers also complain that the content in the adverts has not been sensitive to safety of persons especially children and cited those on broadcast media especially TVs which show kids on motion form with equipment that is ordinarily risky for children’s use like flying cycles. Other adverts show children playing in muddy waters to demonstrate the extent to which detergents are effective which attracts and promotes child behaviour towards hygienically risky habits, the consumers also noted in the petition.

Language used
The petition also pointed out the language used by different individuals by media attractive personalities and their impact on society in general and under age children in particular leads to either positive or negative influence on the audience which include abusive language ,utterance of obscenity and obscene language and broadcasting of pornographic material.
They want the ministry of ICT and National Guidance to enact laws to regulate advertising across all trade and service sector and UCC to enforce the Advertising standards Code which was established in 2015.
The activists want UCC to find a mechanism to regulate content and give deterrent action where violations of consumer rights are detected.

Mr Mutabazi said media houses that continue publish misleading information risk being closed down.
“Media houses who host witch doctors with misleading information that they cure every disease; we will close them. We have an enforcement team searching for those with bad content, guests who abuse and offend others.
“We shall also fine the media house which don’t comply Shs10m until they run broke and close automatically,” Mr Mutabazi said.
The chairperson of National Broadcasters Association, Mr Kin Kariisa, said it is true some media houses host dangerous people like herbalists who claim to cure diseases which should not be the case.
However, the marketing manager of Apex Fm radio station in Jinja, Mr Matias Mutatyama, revealed that it is from hosting people such as herbalists that they can earn revenue to run the station.

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