Apology over Telus tweets

Photo: The Canadian Press

"Take a deep breath, grind yourself. Go kill him."

That was one of the tweets the president of Telus Quebec had to apologize for on Wednesday, a day after one of the company's Twitter handles seemingly went rogue with horrendously translated French-language messages.

Telus's Francois Gratton released a statement apologizing to all the country's francophone population, and stating the tweets should never have been posted.

The tweet in English was more inspirational: "Take a deep breath, ground yourself. Go kill it." The words were displayed over a picture of three jubilant young people seemingly ready to seize the day.

Gratton said the French versions of the tweets were posted by an external agency that managed the Twitter account of the Telus Fund, an independent non-profit company funded by Telus and tasked with producing local content.

The agency charged with managing that Twitter handle "no longer works for Telus," Gratton said.

Other badly translated tweets included doozies that read, in French: "You have to feed (you) Flourish," and, "Fill the holes."

Internet denizens were harsh on the company, questioning whether Telus employed any francophones, and asking the telecom firm to spend some cash to hire some.

As of Wednesday evening, the Twitter handle for the Telus Fund had been removed from the social platform. And the French-language version of the Telus Fund's website was not operational.

"We didn't do our job to ensure all the entities that represent Telus publish texts that are respectful toward the French language and toward all the francophones in the country," Gratton's statement read. "We are deeply sorry about this situation."