Unilever, which supplies TRESemmé products in SA, and the EFF reached mutual ground on the future of the hair-care brand yesterday, says TimesLIVE. While large retailers such as Shoprite Checkers, Pick n Pay and Clicks had agreed to pull TRESemmé products from their shelves after an alleged racist advertisement by the brand, Unilever and the EFF have agreed that these products can be put back on shelves in 10 days' time.

In a joint statement, they said they had reached an agreement on the following: Unilever expresses its remorse to all South Africans, black women in particular, for the racist TRESemmé SA image; Unilever will withdraw all TRESemmé SA products from all retail stores for a period of 10 days as a demonstration of its remorse for the offensive and racist image; Unilever will donate a minimum of 10 000 sanitary towels and sanitisers to informal settlements identified by the EFF.

Among the list of demands from the EFF was that Unilever supply the names of their employees who were behind the ad, but Unilever said it could not give in to this demand.

‘We could not find each other on the publishing of the names of the people responsible for the racist image,’ the joint statement from the two parties said.

‘Moreover, the director involved in the campaign has since left the company and the country,’ the statement revealed. The company would take action against the remaining employees.

Full TimesLIVE report

The Cabinet has joined the condemnation of the advertisement, describing it as ‘profoundly offensive and racist’.

‘Cabinet has noted with great concern an extremely disturbing advertisement published on the Clicks website, which justifiably triggered widespread public outrage,’ its spokesperson, Phumla Williams, said in a statement yesterday, notes News24.

‘Black hair has been the subject of intense politicisation and a source of unjust discrimination in our recent history. Our nation's history is littered with laws and societal norms that equated "blackness" and the associated physical traits – for example, dark skin, kinky and curly hair – to a badge of inferiority,’ she added.

The Cabinet welcomed the immediate corrective actions taken by Clicks.

‘These include their commitment to work with government to promote local products in all their stores and to collaborate with all their suppliers to promote the constitutional values as enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa of 1996. They will also put in place a diversity and inclusion training programme for all their managers and staff.’

It also called on the advertising agencies of Clicks and other stores to adopt tangible programmes which promoted and protected human rights, and raised awareness about 'despicable issues of racism, inequality and discrimination'.

Full News24 report