Woes of copyright and royalties

Last Friday was not business as usual at Star Gardens, a hangout in town.
The proprietor, Robert Kirya experienced one of the most embarrassing days in business. Armed men and inspectors from the Uganda Performing Right Society (UPRS) turned up at his venue, switched off music and confiscated equipment. He tried to negotiate with them but says all this fell on deaf ears.
As he relayed all this, fellow deejays could relate because they have gone through similar experiences with the body that advances the cause of copyright administration in Uganda.
“I told the officials that I would pay after this meeting because I am bitter and angry. The things that you took (confiscated) are machines I use to go and nkuba kyeyo (earn money from doing gigs). When you came in, you served me with a notice from February 2014 and did not give me chance to negotiate. Your officer told me that I would explain myself to the judge,” Kirya narrated.
Dr Innocent Nahabwe, the proprietor of Club Amnesia, Temptations Bar & Restaurant and Galaxy FM had his equipment recently confiscated from both Temptations and Club Amnesia. The inspectors from UPRS also threatened to close his radio station.
“I paid close to Shs4m as loyalties at 9pm in the night,” he adds. It is the same ordeal that Hebert Musisi, a bar owner in Kiwatule, shares. He had to pay Shs500,000 to repossess his equipment after it was confiscated. Same case- non-compliance to payment of a licence to allow him play music in his hangout facility.

Matters of contention
Jude Ssempebwa, the vice chairperson of Uganda Mobile Disco Owners Association, faults UPRS for their mode of operation, specifically pointing out the abrupt seizure of equipment and mishandling of deejays. This costs them their reputation.
UPRS copyright inspector, Aloysius Lubowa, says the minimum annual charge for venues, deejays or mobile discos is Shs530,000.
“Sometimes things overlap. I am requesting that UPRS to send us reminders. Let the reminder not be the day of seizure,” Kirya said, adding that he lost reputation before his clients.
Kirya, a lawyer who is passionate about entertainment, said that he is not in contention with the law but asked UPRS to find more humane and diplomatic ways of resolving issues to do with copyright.
Lubowa says that they seize equipment because this is proof that they can adduce before courts of law. The copyright inspector says when they came in 2010, they began a media campaign and distributed fliers with information on how venue owners and deejays could get licences.

Forging a way forward
During a recent meeting with deejays at Laftaz Lounge, Lubowa said the gathering was a move in the right direction and promised that UPRS would act with restraint on the issue of seizure. The deejays and UPRS agreed to develop a database that would be shared.
He said they would be lenient with deejays in the association and send out reminders.
“The challenge we face is that we can never reach everybody because we are constrained by resources. We are not funded by government and unlike police, which is given police vehicles and salaries, the society has a small allowance from what we collect, to run operations,” he adds.
Lubowa says the society cannot afford to advertise in mainstream media. Placing a full page advert in a mainstream newspaper costs approximately Shs9m.
“The compliance is low. Our budget is low but we have to start somewhere. What we are doing actually is an attempt to rejuvenate the music industry. You are the biggest stakeholders in this industry. Musicians are not reaping big because they are not earning from their loyalties,” he argues.
Dr Nahabwe argues that there is a lot of money to be made by artistes and they would not need to kneel before politicians or even UPRS management.
“From loyalties, they would be assisted with distribution, production, marketing and lobbying government. Artistes would be able to get health insurance and not resort to begging on their deathbeds, but these people at UPRS are only pushing the money line,” Dr Nahabwe further argues.
The deejays, tabled the issue of unfair general fees and unfair seizure fees.
“We are being charged fees in a mode of one-cloth-fits-all which is unfair. They have a seizure release fee which is almost the cost of the licence being levied on us,” Ssempebwa explains.

The fees
Seizure release fees is Shs500,000 while licence fees is Shs530,000. The association vice chairperson also tabled the issue of paying the same fees at whatever time of the year.
The deejays decried double taxation on a single business name where a sound system is split into two or more segments and each has to pay an independent licence.
The deejays also tabled the issue of music acquisition, where in this digital age, they download music, and have to prove that the music is not copyright infringed. Even then, artistes contact deejays and share their music for promotion.
Well, seven out of 10 artistes this reporter asked about the copyright law, did not know about it or requested that they refer me to someone that is conversant. One asked to get back to me, perhaps to turn a few pages, and make findings about the law.

Explaining the law
Norman Mbabazi Akiiki, a lawyer and team leader at President of Intellectual Property Centre (IPC), defines copyright is a bundle of exclusive legal rights concerned with the protection of literary and artistic works, often referred to just as ‘works’.
Lubowa explains that the law states that before one exploits any work, they need to have authorisation from the owner of the rights or his or her agent.

“For one to be charged for infringement of copyright law on a mobile disco, they have to find you using the mobile disco and make a recording of what is happening and produce the footage in courts of law. The law says before you operate, you need to have authorisation or a licence,” Lubowa observes.
Dr Nahabwe on the other hand says challenge is UPRS is a self-imposed artiste society which is neither selected nor voted by the artistes.
“It is not like law society or any other industry association. James Wasula is its perennial General Secretary. They forcefully collect money for and on behalf of members. Their method of remitting the loyalties is arbitrary,” he adds.

He suggests it should be artistes regulating the industry since they understand their core issues better and not be at the mercy of the people that have never hummed into the mic or played a shaker.
Lubowa, however, argues that the low earnings by artistes have led to poor music since artistes are not willing to invest heavily in music that has low returns.
“That is why we are protecting the creators in the industry. We find it hard getting money from deejays because they do not have physical addresses. Even for places with physical address, it is hard. Even Laftaz Comedy Lounge, where we are, have not paid for the licence, and it is October,” Lubowa further explained.

More work needed
Even then, more work needs to be done in sensitising artistes about the law. Many do not know what the law is about and in many instances, because the industry is not structured, have aided abuse of the copyright law.
Artistes need to promote their music and many times approach deejays and music pirates in town to distribute their music. It is an issue that deejays pointed at and implored UPRS to carry out more awareness of copyrights and royalty collection.

“However there are reforms that are necessary to transit to the next level for example the need for extensive awareness for Intellectual Property to the masses country wide catering for users, rights holders, government officials and legislators who in turn shall make the required laws and the need to have Extended Collective Mandates for collecting societies in our copyright laws,” Mbabazi observes.
He suggests that there needs to be tougher punishments and fines to copyright infringers to a punishment higher than a six-year sentence on top of payment of a fine amounting to Shs2m .

What the copyright law says
Copyright is a property right. It is a form of intellectual property and like any other property, copyright can be transferred, bought, sold or inherited. This is described in more detail in the section on licensing and assignment.
Composition. Copyright comprises two main sets of rights: the economic rights and the moral rights. The economic rights are the rights of reproduction, broadcasting, public performance, adaptation, translation, public recitation, public display, distribution, and so on. The moral rights include the author’s right to object to any distortion, mutilation or other modification of his work that might be prejudicial to his honour or reputation.

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