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| AAAN President, Kelechi Nwosu |
There are strong indications of renewed nation building efforts
since the inception of the current government led by President Muhammadu
Buhari. In the light of this, the leadership has left no one in doubt
on its seriousness and devoted attention to rid the nation of corrupt
officials and practices in and out of offices.
However, laudable as the
idea sounds, there has been a high degree of disenchantment among the
populace in view of the economic hardship being experienced by the
generality of the population.
Speaking recently at an interactive session recently especially as
it concerns handling dissenting voices and uncooperative attitudes in
the affairs of the nation, the President of the Association of
Advertising Agencies of Nigeria, AAAN and Managing Director, TBWA
Concept, Mr. Kelechi Nwosu, explained that noncommittal and unbelief
attitude may be purely a communication challenge which termed as “a
missing link” the government is yet to proffer a logical solution.
As a result of this critical missing link, the AAAN President
reasoned the country is so divided: divided along tribal lines,
political lines, religious lines etc. “We believe therefore that we need
to have a campaign to unify us”. The Ministry of Information being the
main communication curator for government, he advised should engage in
research and insight based communication.
“I think this is the time to talk up the Nigerian brand. I think
this is the time to ask what will inspire Nigerians”. This is necessary
because as the fight against corruption rages, a lot of people are sad
and wondering, “how much money was stolen/lost?” whilst they are facing
economic challenges”.
The AAAN President believed this is the most appropriate for the
Federal Government to consider a proper and deliberate campaign, working
with the right communication professionals, to determine what can we do
to inspire the Nigerians to be positive about the country? “We need to
look at what to do to make sure people have great hope in this country.
The Information Minister and its machinery need to dig deeper and find
out from the professionals, especially from our sector how this can be
done”, he asserted.
In a bid to walk the talk without being bugged down government’s
unhealthy bureaucracies, the AAAN has created a campaign to support
campaign against current security challenges and terrorism. “As AAAN
we agreed that our country needed to have a campaign that will unify and
motivate a lot of us to support the war against terrorism” revealed the
AAAN President.
So, working with some of its corporate members, AAAN developed a
campaign aimed at supporting the war against terrorism: mobilise,
inspire, and motivate Nigerians to join the war against the violence
going on especially in the North Eastern part of the country.
Although, the campaign is yet to be exposed, the AAAN hinted that
it is an integrated campaign that will support this whole war against
terrorism using very effective media to deliver the message and solicit
support of Nigerians for the government.
Not minding the fact that the Minister of Information as the
APCON/AAAN supervising minister is yet to meet with AAAN, the
association has gone ahead to share the association’s set out objectives
for the campaign with the federal Ministry of Information and Culture.
“We hope that they have looked at it and will deploy it or integrate
along with the campaign commissioned by the ministry. We have also
continually offered to the Ministry of Information our capabilities as
the foremost creative and communication association in the country and
we hope that they will listen to us and partner with us to build
effective campaigns to support government’s policy directions”, enthused
the AAAN no 1 man.
Nwosu and his team as thoroughbred professional further explained
that the government needs a behaviour change campaign hinged on deep,
resonant insights and expertise while the creative work also needs to
be pre-tested suggesting that the government has to be deliberate in
designing these campaigns otherwise they will not be effective.
While he hopes the government picks interest in the project because
it is an “elected government that has been elected to lead us, work
with us and to help us as a country”, Nwosu was quick to assert that his
association and its other partners (ADVAN,OAAN, MIPAN, BON) will not
hesitate to go ahead with the implementation even when the government
chooses to look the other way. “We will still go ahead because we are
doing it for the country which belongs to all of us. It is very
important that everybody does something in these tough times to support
the government. That is what we believe in in the association”, he
affirmed.
In a related development, The AAAN President warned that the
narrative for the country must change.. For instance, he pointed out a
recent story of a Nigerian, Bennett Omalu, who studied in University of
Nigeria, Nsukka, who went to America and discovered CTE. “We can use
such stories to change the narrative here and abroad about Nigeria”, he
said while adding that the country needs stories that inspire us as a
nation and that will unify our energies to make progress and strike the
sweetspot amongst Nigerians to make them believe in themselves and the
country.
Alluding to Mr. Udeme UFot, a former president of the association’s
paper on Strategic Communication and National Development, Nwosu
advised that Governments should use the same principles of Marketing
Communication that have built big brands over the years, to build her
communication. “We need to have a strategic direction that engages the
audience: The Governments (Federal, State and Local Governments) need to
speak with the people not the current style of more or less speaking at
them. Strategic communication involves aligning our vision with the
communication that will help build the nation”. One of those should be
about unity and belief in the country.
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