OUTDOOR sector has become endangered species in the country. Practitioners contend with regulatory bottlenecks and harsh economy. From left, right and centre, we are been bashed, and the government cares less about our challenges. Rather, it keeps putting pressure on us, not minding the challenges we are facing as businessmen, ” the president of the Outdoor Advertisers’ Association of Nigeria (OAAN), Mr. Babatunde Adedoyin, had declared at an interactive session with the media, about two years, ago.
Interestingly, two years after, for many in the industry, not much has changed. The challenges, as enumerated above, by the OAAN boss, are still very much around, even as Year 2018 ends today.
For instance, for many operators in the sector, the year was nothing, but a continuation of the woes of the previous year, where the sector suffered a dip in the inflow it attracted, during the year.
More worrisome to stakeholders in the sector is the fact that unlike in the past, when elections and electioneering campaign periods were considered a boom for the sector, the outgoing year, had not brought such optimism.
For instance, despite the fact that the general elections are around the corners, one of the challenges confronting operators in the sector remains the continued patronage of non-registered practitioners, by the political gladiators, to market themselves to the electorates, via the outdoor platform.
One of such instances is the indiscriminate pasting of posters in the state, by quacks, for politicians, a development that has left the cityscape dirtier and make operators poorer.
“One is surprised that the regulatory agency in the state has not really deemed it fit to act on a very negative development which has continued to be the norm now, especially during election periods,” argued a practitioner in the sector, who would not want his name in print.
The practitioner wonders why existing laws, guiding outdoor practice in the state are always bent, especially when elections are around the corners.
“We all know that indiscriminate pasting of posters has been outlawed in the state, why allow such for politicians at campaign periods? Are we saying such would be allowed if a brand or a corporate organization wants to launch a new campaign?
“If you wouldn’t allow a corporate brand such ‘privilege’, why give politicians, who are supposed to be custodians of the nation’s laws and orders, who are, at the same time, individual brands?
“What this action simply means is that this set of people, who are supposed to lead by examples are simply telling us they are above the law,” the practitioner stated.
He argued that the activities of quacks and the reluctance of politicians to patronise outdoor practitioners, has been a major factor responsible for the ‘instalmental death’, the sector had continued to witnessed in 2018.
The Publicity Secretary of Outdoor Advertising Association of Nigeria (OAAN), Mr. Femi Ogala also shares similar sentiments.
“I think pasting of posters could be rationalized, but what about the mini billboards, made of planks, and placed on the lampposts being paid for by another brand?
“If you look around the city that is what you see, and unfortunately nobody is talking. It is being done because the agency in charge of outdoor practice in the state, allows such,” he stated.
Ogala added that the outdoor sector would continue to live below stakeholders’ expectations; since revenues that should have accrued to it during this period, would end up as gains for those that are not even within the system.
“When we thought we had gone beyond planks, see what we are seeing on the streets of Lagos as signages for politicians. Besides constituting clutters, it has continued to deface the cityscapes, and brought us back to the era of plank and nails,” Ogala stated.
According to him, it is the outdoor sector and the practitioners, that have vowed to play by the rules that will continue to bear the brunt of the activities of these politicians and their cronies, serving as their outdoor agents.
The decision of J.C Decaux, a Paris-based multinational corporation, known for its bus-stop advertising systems, billboards, public bicycle rental systems, and street furniture, to play in the sector, this year, was not without its ripple effects, also.
Interestingly, while the average resident of the city saw the debut of the foreign firm in the nation’s outdoor advertising scape, as another opportunity to raise the stakes in the sector, some practitioners in the sector saw it the other way.
For this set of practitioners, nothing was wrong with the coming of the foreign outdoor firm, into the nation’s outdoor space, as long as it was ready to play by the rules.
A strong allegation against the foreign firm, then, was that it would be operating illegally in the country, when it officially opened its doors for business; since it never signified its intention, officially, to do such business.
One of the ways it should have done that, some practitioners insisted, was by registering with the Advertising Practitioners’ Council of Nigeria (APCON), the apex regulating body in the advertising industry.
They believed the decision of the firm to play in the sector , without ‘regularizing its papers’, as a total disregard of Decree 55 of 1988, that established APCON.
The decree, they argued, insists that all practitioners, whether individual or corporate, shall consider Nigerian content as an important element of their overall business management, project development and execution.
The foreign company has, however, refuted such claims, insisting that it filed the necessary papers before launching itself out.
The issue of accumulated debt on vacant billboards remained another bone of contention all through 2018.
The major grouse of practitioners with the state regulatory agency, LASAA, Lagos State Signage and Advertising Agency, was the agency’s decision to compel outdoor firms to pay for accumulated bills on vacant billboards in the past four years, totaling about 10 billion Naira.
Practitioners had wondered how the agency had arrived at the huge figure, which had become a heavy financial burden on their firms; since those billboards had earned any revenue for their owners, in the years under review.
“The enabling law mandates mandated LASAA to charge just 12.5% of earnings earned per billboard. In other words, going by LASAA’s statutory rules and enabling law, only 12.5% of billboards with clients campaign can only be charged by the agency. So where are the campaigns they are charging on?” queried another outdoor ad practitioner, who would also not want his name in print.
Of late, there had been silence from the practitioners, but many believe it is nothing, but a silence of the graveyard; since most of these challenges linger.
The post 2018 Outdoor Ad: Bleeding business in a shrinking, over-regulated market appeared first on Tribune Online.
Source Tribune
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