Veteran Musician, Sir Victor Uwaifo, has called out Singer Simi over an alleged intellectual theft. According to the music maestro, the contemporary singer stole the title of his song Joromi without giving him credit.
Uwaifo made this known in an interview with the Annual General Meeting of Copyright Society Of Nigeria COSON, held at Sheraton Hotels, Ikeja, Lagos. The Former Commissioner for arts and culture in Edo State described copyright and intellectual property theft as a very serious issue in Nigeria, saying it must be dealt with urgently as it is reducing the creativity of the new generation of musician.
According to him, the process of making music has now significantly changed from what it used to be in his time, as “more mediocre” are now in the game.
He said
Copyright is a very serious business and the contravention of copyright laws is more serious than you can imagine the Professor of Art said most people still believe that someone can just pick somebody’s work, which we call intellectual property right, and use it for his own benefit of the detriment of the composer, the man who actually created the work; it takes a lot of research to be able to come out with a piece of work.
You know one single track is equivalent to research journal and then a whole record is equivalent to a book publication, so people don’t understand it they don’t know. You don’t just wake up in the university then you just put anything down and you call it a journal or a book. It takes a lot of research to be able to do one piece of music.
The composition, the lyrics, the music, the score, the arrangement, the production and someone will just come and take the work and use it as his own or probably do an advert on it
When asked if he was going to take any legal action against Simi, he replied:
“One after the other. I cannot just take everybody to court at the same time. I don’t know whether he or she; I know she is but I know somebody is behind it.
An LP was sent as a compliment; I’m still looking at it but they were planning to come to Benin to see me; up till now, they haven’t come, so I’m just putting that one on hold. ‘Joromi’ is a franchise; the name never existed before, Benin doesn’t have ‘J’ in their language; if any started with “J” in Benin than it is fake. All consonant works start with vowel sounds. For example, if I use the trademark of one of these soft drinks, it is wrong. So Simi is in Trouble
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