The sellers of fishing tackle have been punished for using the Prime Minister's photograph
The Federal Antimonopoly Service Directorate in the Krasnoyarsk Territory has fined "Rys" (Lynx), a local shop that sells fishing and hunting gear. The antimonopoly body claims that the merchants unlawfully used a photograph of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Minister of Emergencies Sergei Shoigu fishing in Tyva for advertising purposes. The shop may face a fine of up to 500,000 roubles.
The regional FAS charged the owners of the Lynx shop, which is part of OOO Solidarnost, with violating the provision of Article 5 of the Law on Advertising, which forbids "an indication that the object being advertised has the approval of government bodies". The object in question is a banner over the shop entrance with a photograph of Vladimir Putin and Sergei Shoigu fishing in Tyva in a rubber dinghy. The two men were using a boat produced by the Petersburg firm OOO Mnev and Co. (whose products are sold by Lynx), which caught the eye of FAS officers. "The photograph of top government officials fishing in a boat, placed on the façade of the shop building, had been tampered with. The background had been changed and the logo of the boat producer was given more prominence, resulting in a picture with all the features of typical advertisement," Deputy Head of the Krasnoyarsk FAS Oleg Kharchenko explained. Solidarnost would be fined 500,000 roubles.
The businessmen disagree with the ruling. The director of the Lynx shop, Irina Yamshchikova, said that Mnev and Co. had submitted a letter to the antimonopoly bodies confirming its right to use the photographs, which the producers of the boats bought from RIA Novosti. "If Vladimir Putin and Sergei Shoigu used the boats made by a Petersburg company, who is to blame? Mnev and Co. simply provides boats to the Emergencies Ministry and they happened to be in the frame," Ms Yamshchikova explains. The Mnev and Co. sales manager, Kirill Oreshkin, likewise does not see what the Krasnoyarsk businessmen have done wrong. "I've seen the mockup of their advert and I saw no indication that the government members in it were promoting our commodity," he said. "Irina Yamshchikova attributes the charges to the "intrigues of rivals". "The banner was hanging at the entrance to the shop for eight months, but for some reason the authorities noticed it only now," she says.
However, Vladimir Perekotiya, a member of the regional citizens council on advertising, points out that the law On Advertising "clearly states that the use of the images of any persons without their permission is illegal". "It does not matter if it is Vladimir Putin or somebody else," the expert says. "That law is frequently broken. Businessmen use the images of U.S. President Barack Obama and football star David Beckham, but unlike the Prime Minister and the Minister for Emergencies, they are far away and are unlikely to sue." He did not rule out that "the representatives of the territorial government simply did not like the banner on the store front". The vendors of fishing gear did not challenge the FAS decision. "Litigation with the federal government is futile," the vendors lamented.
Dmitry Malkov
