Fast-food chain Nando's uses dead dictators to sell chicken (VIDEO)

GlobalPost

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Nando's, a South Africa-based fast food chain, has launched a controversial new ad featuring look-alikes of dead dictators.

Called "Last Dictator Standing," the festive season TV ad shows a Robert Mugabe look-alike who is throwing a dinner party and reminiscing about the good times with dead dictator friends, including Muammar Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, South African apartheid leader PW Botha, and Idi Amin of Uganda.

British journalist Harry Cole on Twitter described the advertisement as being "spectacularly inappropriate yet hilarious."

Other Twitter users said they were disgusted by the ad.

Nando's, which sells Portuguese/Mozambican-style peri-peri chicken, is known for cheeky ads with a focus on current events. Previous TV and print ads in South Africa have poked fun at traditional polygamy, the Dalai Lama being denied a visa, and the contentious "secrecy bill," passed last week by the country's parliament despite widespread opposition.

More from GlobalPost: Zimbabwe militants loyal to Mugabe angry over Nando's "dictators" ad

More from GlobalPost: South Africans wonder: Has freedom made us fat?

Extended version, with a Chairman Mao-alike:

Sign up for our daily newsletter

Sign up for The Top of the World, delivered to your inbox every weekday morning.