Nigerian Musicians Threaten To Boycott Xmas Events

Pop icon, 2face Idibia bared his mind on the issue and
he his not happy with the current situation while
Banky W, co-owner of Empire Mates Entertainment
(E.M.E) threatened to pull out of all events if the
feud is not resolved soon.
Nigerian musicians have threatened to boycott events
holding this Christmas and afterwards.
Following the ongoing feud between Copyright Society of
Nigeria (COSON) and the joint alliance of the
Independence Broadcast Association of Nigeria (IBAN)
and Broadcast Organization of Nigeria (BON) which has
led to the ban of 96 musicians on radio and TV, COSON
and its members have reacted.
Rising from a stakeholders interactive session that was
recently held on Tuesday, December 10, 2013 at Rumours
Night Club, GRA, Ikeja, Lagos to declare its stance, the
members amongst other things declared that it is not
going to change its position on the issue of royalties even
if their message will be driven with series of boycotts of
events this Christmas season.
Since the ban, many musicians have begun to make their
positions known. Banky W, co-owner of Empire Mates
Entertainment (E.M.E) threatened to pull out of all events
if the feud is not resolved soon.
‘You claim to have banned my artistes and you want them
to perform at your events, I am categorically stating that
if this issue is not resolved by the meeting with Nigeria
Broadcast Commission, then I don’t have a choice than to
pull out all E.M.E artistes from these events‘ Banky said.
Also not happy with the situation, Pop icon, 2face Idibia
bared his mind on the issue. ‘it is sad that some group of
people do not want things to work the way it works every
where in the world’, the ‘African Queen’ singer said. ‘It is
not about me but about the respect for the rule of law
and intellectual property and that’s what we artistes are
demanding for, they pay for everything why not the
music’
Making reference to the boycott, 2face said, ‘This ban will
cost them something, I mean Rhythm Unplugged. The
organisers of Rhythm Unplugged are part of the people
that banned artistes, they have radio and TV stations.’
Also in a similar development, a COSON board member
and CEO of Now Music Efe Omorogbe also threatened to
pull out of events beginning with the ‘Rhythm Unplugged’
event which is a brainchild of Flytime Promotions and the
Silverbird Group, owners of Rhythm FM and Silverbird TV.
Omorogbe threatened to disassociate with the yearly
event because Guy Murray Bruce happens to be an
executive at Silverbird Group and is also the secretary of
IBAN. He said ‘If the whole ban issue is not resolved by
the meeting with NBC, I am saying it here that I will pull
out of Rhythm Unplugged an event which I have been
associated with over the last few years’.
The highly anticipated Headies Awards may also suffer the
same fate as musicians may extend the boycott to the
event. Omorogbe stated that musicians under COSON will
give Ayo Animashaun, owner of Hiphop World Magazine/
HipTV a few days to make public his stand on the ongoing
feud or risk boycott of the highly revered awards.
Responding to the threat, Ayo Animashaun told NET, ‘I
have no comment on that for now. I don’t want to put
my channel on the spotlight on this. You know it is a
young platform’.
The ongoing battle between COSON and BON/IBAN is
heightening as COSON has reiterated its resolve to
enforce broadcast stations to respect Nigeria’s copyright
law by paying royalties and license fees for the works of
artistes.  Now in the season of festivities, fans are no
doubt expecting to have fun and entertainment, but only
time will tell how far musicians are willing to go with the
threat.