Christmas market trader slammed for selling racist golliwog doll of Olympic legend Mo Farah doing the ‘Mo-bot’
The 'completely inappropriate' dolls were banned from the Christmas Market in Kent after the council said they could cause offence
A CHRISTMAS market stallholder in Kent has been blasted after she was caught selling golly dolls of Olympic legend Mo Farah.
The sportsman was depicted as a racist caricature striking his classic "Mo-bot" pose in a white vest with his surname on it at a stall in Rochester.
The term golly doll stems from a fictional character depicted as a rag doll in the children’s story The Adventures Of Two Dutch Dolls And A Golliwogg created by writer Florence Kate Upton in the 19th Century.
The name became associated with racist connotations when it was used as a derogatory term for black people in World War Two.
A photo also shows a Bob Marley doll on sale for £49.95 at Rochester Christmas Market.
Following complaints over the golly dolls at the council-run event, officials blasted the caricature of the "national hero", adding selling the dolls was "completely inappropriate".
Councillor and leader of Medway Labour Group Vince Maple said: "Mo Farah is a national hero and an internationally respected athlete so to have somebody selling dolls of this nature is completely inappropriate at a council-run Christmas event.
"It's supposed to a Dickensian event and these dolls are neither Christmassy nor Dickensian."
Cllr Maple previously tweeted that he had received an email about a stall selling the racist dolls.
He said he had "written urgently to Medway Council officers to seek action on the matter".
Cllr Howard Doe, cabinet member for community services, said: "We do not allow 'Gollys' to be sold at the Rochester Christmas Market.
"We permitted the sale of Rasta dolls within the City of Rochester Craft Fair, at the Rochester Christmas Market last year.
"However, following reports that similar dolls were being sold at the market last weekend we have reviewed the situation again.
"Although the dolls are not labelled as 'Gollys' we understand that they may unintentionally cause offence to some visitors.
"We have therefore decided to ask the stallholder to withdraw the dolls from sale."
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The banning of the dolls at the market comes just months after a man was fined £365 for displaying a golliwog with noose around its neck in his flat window in North Wales.
Jason Wakefield-Jones, 50, was reported to police after two residents spotted the doll peering out of the first-floor of his flat with a noose around its neck.
The property in Prestatyn, North Wales, was across the road from two Indian restaurants and Wakefield-Jones admitted displaying it with intent to cause harassment, alarm or distress and that the offence was racially aggravated.
District Judge Gwyn Jones at Llandudno Magistrates’ Court in North Wales told Jason Wakefield-Jones: “You may think that was funny but it was not.”
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