THE CHALLENGES OF MEMBERSHIP DRIVE IN NIGERIA

  The biggest challenge facing Nigerian musicians in the area of effective copyright protection in the country is sheer ignorance or to put it mildly lack of awareness, so says the membership officer of MCSN, Miss Lara Banjo.According to her many musicians in the country simply do not know that they need to get their works protected in the first place and therefore are not cooperative when approached to get their works registered or get affiliated to a copyright management organisation like MCSN.“As far as most of them are concerned they think they are doing a favour when they are approached to get their music or intellectual property registered for copyright protection’, explained Miss Banjo.

Because of this attitude, she told the Copyright Owner, most of the artistes play hide and seek with MCSN’s Membership officers, such that when they give appointments they would not keep them and giving all kinds of excuses for delaying their affiliations to the organisation.  In the course of such delays, they end up losing a lot of income that would have naturally come to them. Miss Banjo explained further that many of the artists find it more convenient to give their works to broadcast stations (radio and television) and in addition pay them to play their works rather than taking steps to protect the works and in turn earn income from the airplays of the works.Another of the challenges is that some of those who do register expect instant rewards from the society forgetting that payment is only made for works exploited.

Asked what efforts has MCSN made to make these artists understand the workings of copyright administration, Miss Banjo explained that in spite of the fact that MCSN is the most effective copyright administrator in the territory of Nigeria by way of activities such as regular payment of royalties to members and effective litigations [which are always widely publicised] to get infringers to pay for exploited works, most of the unregistered musicians when approached will tell you they do not know where to go and register.
She disclosed that MCSN has a plan to embark on massive education of intellectual property owners for them to appreciate the benefits of having their intellectual property protected by way of effective copyright administration, which will involve litigation, seminars, visits, etc.  “What most of them do not know is that by not protecting their intellectual property they lose incomes [from abroad and at home] which otherwise should come to them, especially those who have registered their works with an organisation like ours MCSN”, she said.