Nigerian Musicians Threaten To Boycott Events

I came across this story on the NET and find it very interesting. Nigerian musicians have threatened to boycott events holding this Christmas and afterwards as a result of the ongoing feud between Copyright Society of Nigeria (COSON) and the joint alliance of the Independence Broadcast Association of Nigeria (IBAN) and Broadcast Organization of Nigeria (BON) which has led to the ban of 96 musicians on radio and TV.

Rising from a stakeholders interactive session that was recently held on Tuesday, December 10, 2013 at Rumours Night Club, GRA, Ikeja, Lagos which had in attendance Banky W, 2Face Idibia, 9ice, Sound Sultan, MI, Azeezat, Ill Bliss, Wunmi Obe, Obiwon, 2Shotz, Audu Maikori, Bayo Omisore and representatives of Burna Boy, DammyKrane, Sir Victor Uwaifo, Ice Prince, Sunny Neji, Solid Star, and Eva Alordiah,  to declare its stance, they came up with a 10-point resolution amongst which was to boycott massively upcoming events to be organised by members of IBAN, Headies Awards and Rhythm Unplugged, if the situation was not resolved by Nigeria Broadcasting Commission, NBC.

The tussle between TV/radio stations and COSON has been on since last year. COSON has suddenly woken up to its responsibilities of demanding for royalties for the musical works of their artistes after the former collecting management organisation, Musical Copyright Society of Nigeria (MCSN,) had failed to do so as a result of legal tussle it was involved in for decades.

COSON has more than 100 artistes signed under it which is over 85% and majority of the popular artistes. 

Since the ban, many musicians have begun to make their positions known. Banky W, co-owner of Empire Mates Entertainment (E.M.E) threatened to pull out of all events if the feud is not resolved soon.

‘You claim to have banned my artistes and you want them to perform at your events, I am categorically stating that if this issue is not resolved by the meeting with Nigeria Broadcast Commission, then I don’t have a choice than to pull out all E.M.E artistes from these events‘ Banky said.

Also not happy with the situation, Pop icon, 2face Idibia bared his mind on the issue. ‘it is sad that some group of people do not want things to work the way it works every where in the world’, the ‘African Queen’ singer said. ‘It is not about me but about the respect for the rule of law and intellectual property and that’s what we artistes are demanding for, they pay for everything why not the music’

Making reference to the boycott, 2face said, ‘This ban will cost them something, I mean Rhythm Unplugged. The organisers of Rhythm Unplugged are part of the people that banned artistes, they have radio and TV stations.’

Also in a similar development, a COSON board member and CEO of Now Music Efe Omorogbe also threatened to pull out of events beginning with the ‘Rhythm Unplugged’ event which is a brainchild of Flytime Promotions and the Silverbird Group, owners of Rhythm FM and Silverbird TV.

Omorogbe threatened to disassociate with the yearly event because Guy Murray Bruce happens to be an executive at Silverbird Group and is also the secretary of IBAN. He said ‘If the whole ban issue is not resolved by the meeting with NBC, I am saying it here that I will pull out of Rhythm Unplugged an event which I have been associated with over the last few years’.

The highly anticipated Headies Awards may also suffer the same fate as musicians may extend the boycott to the event. Omorogbe stated that musicians under COSON will give Ayo Animashaun, owner of Hiphop World Magazine/HipTV a few days to make public his stand on the ongoing feud or risk boycott of the highly revered awards.

Responding to the threat, Ayo Animashaun told NET, ‘I have no comment on that for now. I don’t want to put my channel on the spotlight on this. You know it is a young platform’.

The ongoing battle between COSON and BON/IBAN is heightening as COSON has reiterated its resolve to enforce broadcast stations to respect Nigeria’s copyright law by paying royalties and license fees for the works of artistes. 

Hope them resolve their wahala on time ooo. B4 Nigerian Musicians go join ASUU strike..