Story by Dili Utomi.
“What was in vogue forty years ago is now obsolete and what is in vogue now will be obsolete in the future”
Above is one of the many quotes of the president of the Out-of-home Advertising Association of Nigeria (OAAN) as the association held a press briefing at the conference hall of the OAAN house at Amuwo Odofin, Tuesday.
The event had the OAAN president, Mr. Sola Akinsiku, the vice president, Omo Abunene, secretary, Churchill Nwangwu, the general manager, Chiddy Ibiam and a host of other members, administrative staffs as well as journalists in attendance.
The tumultuous nature of activities as occasioned by the actions of Signage Agencies and some stakeholders in the sector form an aspect of the briefing. Crucially though, the event afforded the association the opportunity to discuss the upcoming annual general meeting (AGM) which is scheduled to take place in August in Ibadan.
In his address, the president said “The meeting, which is our 39th in the series and which marks the end of the first year of the two-year term of this Council is scheduled to hold on Friday, 16th August, 2024 at De Signature Towers, Ibadan, Oyo State, and it will anchor on the theme: Redefining OOH Media in Nigeria: The Practice, The Business and Value Creation. The theme is borne out of our desire to constantly and regularly review and examine the out-of-Home media ecosystem in line with prevailing exigencies with a view to making our subsector of the national economy continuously relevant, responsive in all areas of our engagements and respected by our critical stakeholders”.
His words “In the main, it will also be a time to present our scorecard, and give account of our stewardship to our members, and to, as it were, receive further directives on their desired goals for another year”.
Mr. Akinsiku informed the audience that the AGM will have the governor of Oyo State, Mr. Seyi Makinde as a special guest and that a veteran advertising practitioner, Mr. Lolu Akinwunmi shall be the guest speaker at the August occasion. The Director General of the Advertising Regulatory Council of Nigeria (ARCON), Dr. Olalekan Fadolapo as well as the Heads of the Advertising Sectorial Groups (HASG) and chief executives of the Advertisement and Signage Agencies are also expected to be at the event. While speaking, the OAAN president declared that the Association’s financial year ends in April and that the last AGM was to hold in July, but that a Signage Agency was about to start demolishing billboards then which resulted in the postponement of the last AGM held in Asaba to October 2023 .
He added “Our avowed commitment is to truly redefine and reposition OOH Media, Asset ownership and engagement in our dearly beloved country, Nigeria, in the overall best interest of all critical stakeholders”.
At the questions and answers session, the OAAN president said of the business of Out-of-home (OOH) “We really need to project into the future to remain relevant, the strategies of the past may not may not meet the demands of today, we need to innovate so that we can constantly remain relevant in time. Audience measurement which was not happening twenty years ago is now the order of the day”.
He emphasised the critical importance of the OOH business as he noted that the sector employes people across different professions like fabrication, material supply and large format printing apart from the staff of the various companies. The president gave a rough estimate of one hundred thousand employed persons within the sector as he noted that staffs of the Signage Agencies as well as Regulators are beneficiaries of the indirect employment opportunities that OOH provides.
Reacting further to questions posed to him, the president said “Our sector of the economy is the most challenged and the most traumatised as approval procedures and precessing fees are numerous and multi-faceted and these are excluding the non-practitioners whose activities impact negatively on our business”.
He opined that the Association shall continue to engage the various Signage Agencies in order to get clarifications on issues, but that if that process fails, the option of settlement at the Courts is always readily available as the Association has won many battles with some Signage Agencies.
Many States’ Signage Agencies see OOH as second to crude oil in Nigeria rather unfortunately and this view has created the urge to constantly attack the business with either threat or actual demolishing of billboards belonging to practitioners, these threats usually have the aim of exacting as much cash as possible from this business.
The OAAN president did also add that they might be considering inviting some students of Mass Communication from nearby schools to attend a session of the AGM. He spoke about a probable movement of the secretariat from its present location to another, but that that is not a priority for now.
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