By Princewill Ekwujuru

The Advertising Standards Panel (ASP), a statutory committee of the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON), in its efforts to sanitize the advertising industry in Nigeria, has dragged 3 Advert Managers and 3 Managing Directors to the Advertising Practitioners Investigating Panel (APIP) for investigation.

The Practitioners dragged to the APIP include Advert Managers of Daily Sun, Mr. Paul Onyia, Advert Manager of ThisDay, Mrs. Labake Yembra and the Advert Manager of the Punch Newspaper, Mr. Fatima Obagaye.

Others are Managing Director, Starcom Media Limited, Mr. Ayo Kupoluyi, Managing Director, LTC Advertising Limited, Mr. Victor Edegbe and the Managing Director, Reeds And Colleagues Limited, Mr. Esan Mudashiru.

The practitioners in their official capacities exposed advertisements to the consuming public without approval by the ASP.

The ASP has also referred three unregistered persons to APCON Membership Committee for regularization. They include Mr. Kennedy Iwuala, the Managing Director, Pure & Secure Water USA Limited, Ms. Ihejieto Amaka, the Business Development Executive, DDB Limited and Ms. Juliet Obinwa, the Sales and Marketing Manager, Channels Television, Lagos. They used their official capacities to expose advertisements in the media without being registered members.

If the unregistered persons fail to comply with the Nigerian Advertising Laws, Rules and Regulations as provided for in Act 55 of 1988 by regularizing their membership and stop parading themselves as advertising practitioners within an approve time lag communicated to them by APCON, they stand to be arrested.

Also if indicted by the APIP, the advert managers and managing directors will be referred to Advertising Practitioner’s Disciplinary Committee (APDC) whose pronouncement is equivalent to a verdict handed down by a high court in Nigeria. The judgments can only be challenged at the appeal court.

The Advertising Standards Panel is a statutory committee of APCON charged with the responsibility of ensuring that advertisements conform to the prevailing laws of the federation as well as the code of ethics of the advertising profession.

The Committee ensures that only decent, honest, and truthful advertisements are carried in the media.

According to the APCON Law and ASP’s mandate, practitioners are required to submit their advertisements for approval and obtain certificate of clearance before exposing such advertisements to the public.