NIGERIAN MUSIC LABEL OWNERS JOIN PMAN TO PROTEST THE CONTINUED ILL TREATMENT OF COSON BY THE NCC

The powerful Music Label Owners & Recording Industries Association of Nigeria (MORAN) has joined the Performing Musicians Employers’ Association of Nigeria (PMAN), South-East zone, to ask the Director – General of the Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC), Mr. John Asein, to quickly end the protracted conflict between the NCC and Copyright Society of Nigeria (COSON).

In a recent letter to the NCC DG copied to COSON and several senior government officials and signed by MORAN’s National President, Mr. Calistus Okeke, the organization wrote as follows:

“When in January 2019, it was announced that you had been appointed the new Director-General of the Nigerian Copyright Commission, many of us in MORAN heaved a sigh of relief. We believed that as a result of your appointment, the NCC will be repositioned and that the commission would move away from the unproductive combativeness of your predecessor, Mr. Afam Ezekude. We have indeed looked forward to a concerted effort by you to close ranks with the key partners of the NCC so as to rebuild the copyright system in the country.

“The NCC cannot have any stronger partner than Copyright Society of Nigeria (COSON) to which most members of MORAN belong and of which members of MORAN are proud. There cannot be any doubt that COSON is the one shining example that the copyright system in Nigeria can work. It is the window of the Nigerian copyright system to the world.

“At MORAN, we believe that you have the skills to end the war which broke out between the NCC and COSON over the attempted insurgency against the leadership of COSON in 2017. We are shocked that the NCC has continued to follow the lead of those of its officers who have promoted the ambition of one individual and his handful of friends over the desire of an entire industry.

“As the commission prepares to celebrate 30 years of its existence, we at MORAN humbly advise that every effort be made by you to quickly end the friction between the NCC and COSON which has gone on for too long. To us, the celebration of 30 years of the NCC without COSON is clearly the celebration of failure.

The letter ended with the words: “For the avoidance of doubt, members of MORAN protest the continued ill treatment of COSON by the NCC and we say that enough is enough.”

It will be recalled that in its own letter to the NCC DG, Mr. John Asein, signed by its leader, Chief Morocco Maduka, the South East PMAN wrote, “Let it be clear that we have no interest in the self-serving machinations of Efe Omorogbe, Toju Ejueyitchie, Pretty Okafor and their clique. These people do not speak for us and the attention being paid to them by the NCC is getting to the point where the entire copyright system will be torn apart irretrievably”.

The association advised the DG to put on his thinking cap and act with wisdom ending with the words, “A stitch in time saves nine”.

FOR COSON: