Minister’s delay in appointing APCON new chairman gives room for lobby

There are movements by certain interests in the corridors of Labaran Maku, minister of information, over the appointment of new chairman of Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON), BusinessDay has learnt. This is coming as the minister delays in appointing a new chairman three months after the expiration of the tenure of Lolu Akinwunmi, the outgoing chairman of APCON appointed in 2010.

A source told BusinessDay that “there are certain movements over the appointment” especially as the minister delays in appointing a candidate from the six nominated fellows of APCON submitted to him.”

Though the source did not mention categorically those who are lobbying either for themselves or for some nominated people, there are certain interests who support the Lolu Akinwunmi-led advertising reform and others who think aspects of the reform are centric, created by an operator and which negates government investment drive. There are other interests based external factors.

The source said that the advertising industry is very much interested on who becomes the next APCON chairman following the varied interests and issues surrounding the APCON advertising recent reform. It is interesting that some advertising practitioners favoured the reform because of its protectionist stance while others opposed it because of what they called conflicting interests.

The quiet lobby is symptomatic of the picture that played out after the tenure of Olu Falomo who succeeded Ifeanyichukwu Moemeka. Moemeka and Falomo were numbers 1 and 2 respectively in the APCON list but the ‘old’ order was altered when May Nzeribe was appointed while Ayo Owoborode is number 3 in the list. Chris Doghudje, number 5 on the list, who had repeatedly said that he did not lobby for the job succeeded Nzeribe while Lolu Akinwunmi number 59 succeeded Doghudje.

It is not clear therefore what criteria the minister will consider in selecting a candidate but as it stands and following the list submitted to the Minister, Nnorom is the oldest in the APCON list followed by Akinbobola and Ufot in that order. The sixth nominee is not identified by the source.

It was gathered that among the submitted names are Funmi Onabulo, the CEO of Bates and Cosse who had led AAAN as chairman; Willy Nnorom is one of the oldest serving members in the council and has served APCON and AAAN in various capacities including chairman of APCON Committee on Advertising Practice Reforms (ACAPR); Udeme Ofot is the CEO of Saatchi and Saatchi and has done well for the industry; Ade Akinde is the chairman of Advertising Standard Panel of APCON and Babu Akinbobola is another candidate who has equally contributed to the growth of the industry.

An analyst said, “in all the calculations, it is obvious that the APCON hierarchy has a laid out model to see to the smooth implementation of the Akinwunmi’s/Nnorom’s 5th advertising reform. This for once will sort out the continuity conundrum which is always the bane of development even in the larger society.”

By: Daniel Obi