COPYRIGHT LAW AND UGANDAN MUSIC; What the Iryn Namubiru, Lyto Boss, Kusasira Anjagala saga means for the industry


This week on Wednesday 19th somewhere in the fully packed Entebbe town courtroom the press was amok. They hastily rushed to take shots of a large light complexioned woman who seemed to be eager to reach in time so as not to anger the judge by arriving late. This was not one of the high profile murder cases or abuse of office trials that have sold headlines for our dailies and tabloids. The woman was Nu Eagles Band singer Catherine Kusasira who was answering to fraud charges among others. She appeared before the court and pledged total cooperation with the law and its agents. She also begged to be given more time to find someone whose name has kept showing up everywhere in this scandal….Little Boss. Depending on the highly needed outcome of the case, singer and songwriter Lyto Boss could become the hero that won back the dignity, acknowledgement, reward and recognition for the hard work of songwriters or the example who will be remembered to have tried to battle two of Uganda’s most known self-proclaimed divas.
It’s almost impossible to pick interest in the issue of copyright if you are one of the majority of folks who have gotten away with consuming people’s hard work products without paying the deserved amount. The day when your work is taken and you do not get paid for it or your acknowledgement is denied, you wish for it. It was until I took a TV show proposal to one of Uganda’s most loved and powerful  broadcasters and I was told that awful ‘we will contact you’ statement. Months down the road I saw the product of my proposal on screen. However this time, the show’s host was a pretty girl and the segments were changed. On ranting I found out that I was hit with the revelation that this has been happening for a long time. Broadcasters have been ruthlessly stealing people’s ideas and not paying them for them. I first heard of copyright law demand and suggestion many years ago when some Kenyan musicians who included the beautiful radio host Sheila Mwanyiga and star Red San, took to the streets and held a silent protest…a plea to be rewarded for their work. Copyright has become so volatile an issue that it featured on Fox’s hit series Empire last season.
Copyright involves you buying albums from stores and artistes actually earning from these sales. The idea is similar to what Kasiwukira used to do with cassettes in the days before the dvds and compact disc revolution destroyed the control over how many copies of a track would be out in the market. Today their work is downloaded off the internet for free and copied into millions of copies by unlicensed middle men. The idea of copyright also forbids that lovely collection of music you have which features your favourite tracks from all your most loved musicians as music will be sold in albums. What this means is every musician has to work extra hard to make their music wanted enough to be bought not to flook some collection and get known from there.
Before the Anjagala scandal, musicians have also gotten away with stealing the hard work of many songwriters and not paying or acknowledging. Once upon a time singer songwriter Lyto Boss wrote a track and took it to Catherine Kusasira and offered to sell it to her. When Kusasira took the said song to her bosses and managers they realized the song could not only not match her style but also was overly vocally challenging. In Uganda when one mentions vocals, Iryn Namubiru’s name is usually the first to come up. So Kusasira takes said song to Fusion Records the company that deals with Iryn’s career as an artiste. Fusion Records manager Farouk Muyimbwa has stated that they paid Kusasira one million, a figure that has come down from the two million Iryn mentioned during an interview on NBS’ Pundonor Magazine when invited to give her side of the story. Allegations state that Kusasira never gave Lyto Boss a penny and took all the money for herself. She however claims that she has been set up and that Iryn’s rumored fiancĂ©e and owner of Fusion Records Captain Kasami has been giving her money for ‘personal’ reasons ‘as a friend’ and not as per contract…a very strange statement even to the uninterested layman. Now Lyto Boss has sued Namubiru and wants to be awarded damages in addition to redoing the song, a fact which has promoted the Anjagala song…Ugandans love a good scandal. Namubiru has counter sued Kusasira and has accused her of some criminal dos like fraud, causing financial loss. These have provided fodder for the dailies, websites and tabloids in the country and could possibly become Uganda’s biggest music industry scandal.In the past we have heard singer Bankri claiming that Sheebah Karungi’s Twesana song was his and in the past when radio host and struggling musician Titie Tabel accused producer Steve Jean of stealing her Kanchachanche song and giving it to his girl band Blu*3. So it’s been years and years of accusations and counter accusations but no serious action has ever been taken. If Lyto Boss wins this war, it will be a landmark step.
Wisdom Kaye, a member of the legal department of the Uganda Performing Rights Society (UPRS) has pushed for justice. The society has the duty and responsibility to protect the rights of musicians and is also the pressure hand behind the advocacy for the copyright law. Lyto Boss is a member of this society. Iryn Namiru risks paying over 50 million shillings in damages if she loses this and Catherine Kusasira has a lot more to lose if she really committed the fraud. It is a shame that our musicians continue to thrive on people’s sweat which they insist to use while unpaid for. Ugandan musicians also have to realize that the only way to beat this and for any hope for copyright to succeed here for them to earn millions off their work and be like their counterparts in South Africa and Nigeria, they have to come together and fight this as a whole and not as individuals. However so long as they are divided, I don’t see any Ugandan buying a Go Mama album off Amazon(no offence Bebe Cool) when he/she can get the music at a cheap price of Shs 1500 at their DVD dealer’s kiosk in town.

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