By-Chicken Slice and Chicken are embroiled in a bitter war of words over advertising trademarks.

Founder and chief executive officer of the former, Tawanda Mutyebere, has accused his competitor Chicken Inn of bullying.

This comes after Chicken Inn filed an application at the High Court in 2019 seeking an interdict against Chicken Slice using what it termed its trademarks.

Chicken Inn sought to have Chicken Slice barred from using red and yellow colours on its products and also to stop using the word “Luv” in their payoff line.

The company argued that Chicken Slice had used “Luv” in its burger and grill logo, saying it had always used “Luv Dat Chicken” since 1987 before Chicken Slice started using “I Luv it” on its burger boxes.

However, High Court judge Justice Sylvia Chirawu-Mugomba last month dismissed the application by Chicken Inn.

Speaking to NewsDay on Thursday, Mutyebere said Chicken Inn did not invent the word “luv”. He said:

There was no case. The idea here is about bullying. Where on earth would one not be allowed to use the word luv?

Love is not a coined word, it’s generic — whether you use the word love or luv.

The word Luv is actually in the Oxford dictionary and, therefore, you cannot say this is my word that I am using.

Where on earth can one say red or yellow is my colour? That’s ridiculous. You cannot register a colour.

In Zimbabwe, if they do not want to use the colour red, it then means everyone using the colour red must stop using the colour right from the national flag of Zimbabwe.

They are just there to try and frustrate us, but we will never be frustrated with such kind of poor attacks.

You cannot feed Zimbabwe by yourself.

Mutyebere described the court application by Chicken Inn as “tricks of a bully”. NewsDay