/ 8 March 2005

Boy nicks dad’s salary to woo TV star

A seven-year-old Jordanian boy stole his father’s hard-earned salary to buy prepaid phone cards to vote for his favourite female candidate on a television reality show, Petra news agency reported on Sunday.

The young Jamal was so enamoured by Algerian candidate Salma al-Ghazali, who appears on the Star Academy reality show broadcast on Lebanon’s LBCI satellite channel, that he decided to steal his father’s salary to pay for his declaration of love.

The reality show, a copy of a French programme of the same name, was launched in December 2003 on the Lebanese channel. In the show, 16 Arab male and female teenagers live under the same roof and compete in a talent contest.

Each week, one of the candidates is voted out following training sessions in singing, acting and dance choreography.

According to Petra, the boy stole his father’s modest salary — 420 dinars (about R3 400) — and bought prepaid telephone cards, which he generously distributed to youths on condition they call and vote for Salma.

After frantically searching for the envelope with his hard-earned cash, Jamal’s father was tipped off by a neighbour who had seen the boy handing out phone cards to his mates.

The father was able to recover about R2 200 after cashing in phone cards that his son had not yet distributed, the agency said. — AFP