The Registrar of the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria, APCON, Alhaji Garba Kankarofi, recently came down hard on quack in the industry to regularise their practice or be ready to face the wrath of the law.

The Registrar, who spoke in Lagos at the long service award ceremony organised to honour some of the council’s members of staff vowed that it would do all it could to rid the advertising industry of quacks.

He said that the council could not tolerate illegal advertising practitioners in the country any more, saying “We will do all we can do to ensure that we get rid of quacks in the industry”. He added that anybody found operating illegally would be prosecuted.

The APCON registrar said that the council had been able to reduce the number of illegal practitioners drastically in the last four years.

“Everybody is trying to comply with APCON rules now, being the regulatory body for all the advertising firms in Nigeria,” he said.

Kankarofi expressed gratitude to the 10 senior members of staff that were given long service awards for giving their best to the council. Early this year, the council, after several sensitisation visits to advertising establishments and warning notices to illegal persons in advertising practice, it commenced the arrest and prosecution of offenders.

The crackdown on offenders took the enforcement team of APCON to advertising agencies and media organizations identified as employing unlicensed persons who were invited for questioning by the police.