APCON should restructure and regulate itself, says Adisa
The Managing Director/CEO, Noah’s Ark Communications Limited, Lanre Adisa, has called for a total restructuring of the present status of the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON) away from being a government parastatal to more of an independent body capable of regulating itself.
Speaking recently in an exclusive interview with MARKETING EDGE in Lagos, Adisa observed that the present situation whereby the Council is treated as a parastatal to one of government ministries was not well deserving for the advertising industry.
According to the agency boss, rather than sit down and continue to wait on government to, one day look in its direction, stakeholders in the industry should come together and consider the creation of a parallel Council that would allow for effective self regulation of the industry.
He added that such a parallel Council, when in existence, must develop a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to be binding on all stakeholders and such that would spell out the standards of professional behaviour in a manner similar to what obtains in the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN ).
Lamenting over what he termed government’s insensitivity and less-than-serious concern to the reconstitution of APCON Council over the past four years, the agency boss said it was needless that the industry should fold its arms and continue to wait while things continue to go in the wrong way.
In his words: “one of the things that came out of the recent national advertising confab is that, in as much as we would like government to recognise what we do and play its own part, we should no longer wait for a government has failed to reconstitute APCON Council for 4 years. Are we prepared to wait for another 4 years? There is no guarantee that anything is going to change if we continue waiting as far as I am concerned.
“Most people feel the same way as well, so one of the things we told ourselves is that we should look at self regulation. If there is no Council recognised by the government or by law, maybe we should have a parallel Council somewhere,” Adisa suggested.
He continued: “And if we all come together and have an MoU that this parallel Council shall govern how we behave in terms of self regulation and things we have to do, why not? If the industry agrees to collectively have a big umbrella body of stakeholders because we are all in this together, and if we all can have a common understanding together that this is where we want to go, why not?
“I think the status of APCON itself, perhaps, needs to change from being a Council which is seen as a parastatal of government and which it is not, to more of an institute like ICAN and the rest of them. With that APCON can actually have a say in governing itself thereby raising its own funds and becoming independent of government.”
Adisa opined that APCON should not tie itself down by waiting and hoping that one day government would look in its direction.
“We are the ones that go with bold ideas to clients and say, ‘do things differently! Four years in the life of any organisation is a very long time, now we are going to do another 8 years and that’s what it means; so that was the sentiment at the conference,” he concluded.
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