Tony Agemonmen, President, NIMN and Chairman of Council

GODDIE OFOSE, Lagos

Over 200 organisations are at the receiving end of National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria’s (NIMN) non-compliance with the provision of the NIMN Act, which mandates marketing professionals and marketing related organisations in the country to obtain practice license from the Institute.

The President of the NIMN and Chairman of Council, Mr. Tony Agenmonmen made this known during the annual marketing conference and dinner in Abuja recently.

He said the Institute has written to the Police, EFCC, ICPC, the Attorney General and Minister of Justices of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and other relevant security agencies in the country over its planned raid of these companies.

Agenmonmen who spoke at the dinner of the event told the highly distinguished audience that the Institute has written to over 200 companies but only a few respond. “we are ever ready to sanitize this industry and reposition it for greater good of all,” he said.

In September 2017, Agenmonmen said there were thousands of marketing professionals in Nigeria who are not registered with NIMN, adding that by the position of the law, they are clearly in violation of the NIMN Act No 25 of 2003.

He noted that the responsibility for compliance rests on both the individuals and the companies that employ them.

According to him, Section 20(2) of the Act states: “If on or after the coming into force of this Act, any person who is not a member of the institute practices or holds himself out to practice as a marketer for, or in expectation of reward or takes or uses any name, title, addition or description, implying that he is in practice as a marketer, he commits and offence.”

In view of its determination to encourage such erring members to comply with the provision of the law, NIMN has created a window of opportunity for a special Fas -Tracked Executive membership programme. This programme covers all categories of membership, including associate, full member and fellow.

Agenmonmen declared that interested professionals can register for the fast- tracked programme through its online portal. He also added that those who may not be able to meet the requirement for the fast tracked executive membership will need to follow the examination route. Interested candidates were given between 12 September to 31 December, 2017, to undertake the programme but that window had long shot and prospective members are now expected to go through the normal process to get registered or face the law.

Meanwhile, at the conference the Institute conferred the 7 members with fellows, 15 members were upgraded to fellows and 4 honorary fellows.

The Marketing Director of Nigerian Breweries Plc, Franco Maria Maggi, GMD, Dentus Aegis, Emeka Okeke and Managing Director of Tequila, Ayodele Elias were among the fellows while the Head Marketing and Communications, First Bank of Nigeria Mrs. Folake Ani-Mumuney, GMD, TPT International, Modupe Adetokunbo, and Managing Director, Neo Media & Marketing, Ehi Braimah were among the upgraded to fellow.