By Osagie Alonge
The Copyright Society of Nigeria (COSON) has slammed a lawsuit against one of Nigeria’s popular hotels – Transcorp Hilton Abuja as well as US company, Hilton International Management LLC.
The copyright body claims Hilton ‘has done nothing to end the brazen abuse of the intellectual property rights of owners of copyright in musical works and sound recordings in the huge facility managed by it in Nigeria and has rather continued to enjoy the profit emanating from such abuse’.
COSON, which has had similar cases with Cool FM, Wazobia FM and the Silverbird Group, is asking an Abuja high court for the award of more than N3b against the Defendants in ‘unpaid royalties, interest on the unpaid royalties, general, exemplary and aggravated damages for the unauthorized copying, communication to the public, permission to perform and infringement of the copyright in the musical works and sound recordings belonging to its members, affiliates and assignors’.
‘They have behaved as if Nigeria is a nation without laws and all music found in Nigeria is theirs to profit from as they wish. Let it be clear that we are not backing down’, Tony Okoroji, COSON boss said in a statement made available to NET.
In the last two months, COSON has filed several multi-billion naira copyright infringement actions and has signed copyright royaltyagreements with different commercial users of music such as Google, Multichoice, Wazobia FM, STV/Rhythm FM, FRCN, LTV, and Galaxy TV.
