APCON to clampdown on unregistered practitioners, says Registrar

Alhaji Garba Kankarofi, the Registrar, Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON), said on Monday that the council would soon clampdown on illegal advertising practitioners in the country.

Kankarofi made the remark while receiving the executive committee of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Lagos Chapel, led by its Chairman, Mr Tayo Ikujuni.

He said the council was established by law to regulate the activities of advertising companies in social, political, manufacturing and services sectors.

“We are an agency backed by law to issue licences and provide regular training to corporate bodies, and also to train multinational companies in knowing the trend of doing adverts in Nigeria.

“We have teams that provide regular training to professionals and to see to it that they do things properly.

“We have a team that can arrest and investigate offenders who do not believe they have to go through APCON before placing their adverts,’’ Kankarofi said.

Kankarofi said there was need for Nigerians to understand the role of APCON in growing the nation’s economy.

He added:“For long we have been misunderstood; many do not accept that we are backed by law.

“We would be looking at training some members of the NUJ such as NAN reporters in reporting our activities for increased awareness of our operations,’’ the APCON boss said.

Earlier, Ikujuni had described the visit as part of efforts to create a synergy and foster good relationship between the union and the council.

According to him, it is to find a way of assisting the two organisations in the areas of publications, in-house training and understanding the functions of the two establishments.

“NAN has over 250 subscribers, we project Nigeria to the international community and we hope to exploit the same opportunity to project APCON in the right manner,’’ Ikujuni said. (NAN)