Princewill Ekwujuru
The House of  Representatives Committee on Information and National Orientation has  given their full support in ensuring that all advertisements conform to the Code of Advertising Practice.

The Committee which visited APCON on oversight function urged the regulatory body to enforce all advertising laws including political advertising.

According to the Chairman of the Committee, Mr. Ahmed Aliyu Wadada who responded to APCON Registrar’s remark that some media houses in Nigeria have not identified with the requirement of clearance of advertisement before exposure said APCON should forward to the house what it considered appropriate to ensure that all advertisements conform to rules and regulations.

The Registrar of APCON earlier admonished politicians to engage the services of registered Advertising Practitioners in creating and exposing their political advertisements in order to ensure high communication effectiveness and production quality.

The APCON Registrar also used the occasion to present to the House Members what he called challenges of the regulatory body. Some of the challenges as mentioned by the Registrar include the amendment of the APCON enabling Act N0 55 of 1988 to conform to modern challenges.

He equally mentioned the need to check the issue of expatriate’s take_over of businesses from local practitioners in the country, a situation he described as a constraint for development of the home grown professionals.

He also lamented the difficulty in getting the campaign organizations of the various presidential aspirants to submit their campaign materials for necessary clearance.

Other challenges as mentioned by the Registrar include the need to expand the operations of APCON to every state in Nigeria, the procurement of permanent office in FCT and the funding of APCON study manuals