Advertising agencies ask n’assembly to scrap APCON

The Association of Advertising Agencies of Nigeria (AAAN) has asked the national assembly to amend the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON) Act.

AAAN made the demand during a public hearing organised by the house of representatives committee on information, national orientation, ethics and values on a bill to amend the APCON Act.

In its presentation, AAAN said the Advertising Regulatory and Practitioners Council of Nigeria should be established to replace APCON.

AAAN said the proposed regulatory body will have the powers to establish code for the practice of the profession and will regulate all forms of advertising in Nigeria.

AAAN said the replacement of APCON will widen the regulatory framework of advertising practice to include non-registered organisations.

It said when passed into law, the Act will prevent the litigations that have befallen APCON.

The association also recommended that a seven-member board appointed by the president should be set up to oversee the affairs of the council.

“The entire members of the Governing Board shall be appointed by the President,” it said.

“This is a fundamental deviation from the provision of the principal act where the president appoints only the Chairman, the Minister appoints nine persons and the Association of Advertising Practitioners of Nigeria elects ten persons.

“The twenty-man council in the principal act is reduced to a seven-man governing board. The core advertising sectors will have only two representatives in the seven-man governing board.

“The overseeing Ministry will have one representative. The public representative will be three.”

Jenkins Alumona, AAAN vice-president, said the new Act will curtail quackery in the advertising industry.

“The advertising industry and the Nigerian business environment will be the greatest beneficiary of this change,” Alumona said.

“We need to end the use of the advertising space to sell lies in the guise of advertising. Under the current law, non-practitioners can get away with placing unvetted and unprofessional advertising messages in the media. This must stop and the new law will ensure this.”