National chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole, in mid-July, 2018 directed the Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, to inaugurate the board members of federal agencies and parastatals under his ministry in one week or be suspended from the party.
Oshiomhole was quoted to have said that APC under his leadership would not continue to tolerate ministers who abuse their offices and disrespect President Muhammadu Buhari by refusing to carry out Buhari’s orders.
The parastatals and agencies in question were the Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund (NSITF), National Directorate of Employment (NDE), National Productivity Centre (NPC), and Michael Imoudu Institute for Labour Studies (MINILS).
As at the time Oshiomhole issued this directive, Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria, APCON, had been without a board for about three years running. Nine months after that directive, APCON is still without a board. The question is, why was the same directive not issued to other ministries, such as Ministry of Information to inaugurate APCON board? Or are the implications of not inaugurating agencies’ boards not applicable to APCON?
Operating without a board for over four years is severely affecting the agency. For instance, APCON is waiting for a re-constitution of its board to push for the review of APCON law, specially the Code to accommodate digital Ad monitoring and regulation.
It is against this background that digital Ad is gradually gaining ground, with some misleading information. Digital Ad is presently accounting for about 6 percent of Nigeria’s about N120 billion annual above the line Ad spend.
“When we had a council, there was a committee working on digital Ad monitoring and regulation to develop administrative and legal framework to assist the enforcement on digital Ads. The dissolution of APCON council stopped the committee’s work,” APCON acting CEO, Ijedi Iyoha told BusinessDay recently.
“It is a difficult challenge for us now but the only thing we do is look at the social media and those we know we write to them on any infringement. When we have a council, we will push for the review of APCON law” she added.
On other functions that APCON cannot perform well without a board, Iyoha said the issue of installing new fellows had not been done, stressing that there are so many people on the queue. Also, APCON has not held Advertising Day, which is a big forum for all stakeholders in the advertising industry. The day involves the delivery of lectures by renowned practitioners and the giving of awards. Thirdly, there are no disciplinary committees to sit on the cases of practitioners. “What we do in this instance is to write to the defaulting members.”
The Buhari administration in July 2015 dissolved the board of APCON alongside the boards of other agencies and parastatals. However, up until now, APCON, which regulates Nigeria’s Advertising industry, has no council.
The implication of this, according to experts, is that the industry is not moving the way it is supposed to move. There are some reforms that probably would have come on board by now and there are some that would have been enforced, but all these are not happening.
Nigeria’s advertising industry is segmented and it is not sure what the industry is doing collectively or within their groups to ensure their apex body council is constituted. “They may be enjoying the situation,” an observer said.
When Ikechi Odigbo, President of the Association of Advertising Agencies of Nigeria (AAAN), took oath of office late last year, he outlined the new direction for the body under his leadership to include professionalism and prestige of the AAAN.
He also pledged to push for the proper constitution of the Advertising Practitioners’ Council of Nigeria (APCON) Council and push strongly for reforms through intense lobbying and leveraging influencers with the regulatory ministry and other relevant government institutions. Since then, it is not clear how far his administration has gone to these promises.
2019 political campaign
The ruling political party and the others continued with such levity and disregard of the advertising industry during the 2019 political campaigns. Much of the campaign jobs did not go the professionals operating in the advertising industry.
Unlike in the events leading to 2015 elections when multi-billion Naira campaign messages passed through the traditional media, it was different for the above- the-line media in the political campaign for the forthcoming 2019 elections.
With the belief that the 2019 elections will be similar to 2015 when PDP and APC, two leading parties spent about N4 billion in adverts on traditional media alone, various media organisations positioned for such business, but they got disappointment.
A report by Compliance and Content Monitoring Limited, CCM, a technology player in media monitoring in Nigeria had put 2015 presidential elections media advertising spend by PDP and APC on Above-the-Line communication platforms at N3.23 billion.
But this time, the traditional media lost out as below-the-line operators reaped the campaign funds. Above-The- Line (ATL) advertising is where mass media such as television, radio, print and internet are used to promote messages. The messages are targeted at wider audience.
On the other hand, Below- the-line (BTL) advertising involves one to one, distribution of pamphlets and banners usually on the roads.
Assessing the trend, Kayode Oluwasona, former president of Association of Advertising Agencies of Nigeria (AAAN), agreed that campaign funds in 2019 did not go to ATL media and to agencies who are professionals.
He said that the politicians were rationalising expenditure as they were employing least-cost producers and printers for their jobs but what they got was disappointing quality of campaign materials.
He regretted that most politicians did not derive value for the little they spent because they did not use professionals in their communication.
Tola Bademosi, the CEO of BD Consult, a top PR firm based in Lagos, said that the politicians changed game pattern with more involvement of grassroots mobilisation.
He said for instance, APC strategy this year was door to door approach, with funds moving to those agencies that handled this area. According to him, people realised that 2019 election was different from the past. Pointing out that it was more of one on one, he argued that it would be difficult to calculate the amount spent on political campaign in 2019.
Synergy needed by operators
It is clear now that operators in the industry need to first come together and strategise on how to reposition the industry. Without this, and if the private sector behaves like the public sector, then the industry is headed for danger.
The industry needs to educate government on its relevance to the wellbeing of the economy. This will ensure the re-constitution of APCON council and pave way for agencies’ engagement in public service.
Alternatively, practitioners can create an institute for the industry while APCON can run as a regulatory. APCON was established by an Act 55 of 1988 and Act 93 of 1992. The provisions of Act 55 of 1988 are not significantly different from the Act establishing many professional institutes but APCON Act, however created a Council rather than Institute.
The difference, according to experts, is that whereas Institute is strictly a professional body, a council has the dual role of a practice regulation as well as professional body.
As it is, APCON has to remain as a government agency if it has to be effective and successfully carry out its functions of regulating the advertising industry. Practitioners in the industry should not allow government lethargy, inaction and disinterest to derail the course of the profession.
Daniel Obi
