“MUSIC IN A SOCIETY ON THE ROAD TO A SOCIO-POLITICAL REVOLUTION”
- Issued on behalf of the Nigerian Music Industry from COSON HOUSE by the Chairman, Copyright Society of Nigeria, Chief Tony Okoroji.
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This Thursday, September 1, 2022, the music industry in Nigeria once again marks “No Music Day”. It is our wish to remind everyone that “No Music Day” is a day that the industry in Nigeria has dedicated annually to bringing the attention of the Nigerian nation to the widespread infringement of the rights of songwriters, composers, performers, music publishers, record labels and other stakeholders in the nation’s creative industry. You may hear voices of disputes and disagreements or different approaches to addressing the challenges of our industry, but we are united, we are one and cannot be separated in our demand and determination to end the reckless and rabid stealing of the fruits of the labour of Nigeria’s creative people.
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Lest we forget, “No Music Day” is traceable to that historic week in 2009 when Nigerian artistes of different shades and many of our friends embarked on a weeklong hunger-strike staged in front of the National Theatre, Lagos. The hunger strike which was a result of our frustration with the devastating level of intellectual property theft in Nigeria was the prelude to what has become known as “No Music Day” in Nigeria. On September 1, 2009, practitioners in the entire Nigerian creative family massed in front of the National Theatre and for days, refused to eat or drink and demanded that the over 400 licensed broadcast stations in the country, who use music as the key raw material for their operations, should not broadcast music for a significant period of a day.
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While we have used music as our point of contact, our protest is hinged on the fact that if Nigeria must make serious economic progress, we should stop the platitudes and take strong national action against the violation of the rights of not just musicians, but the violation of the rights of authors, publishers, actors, movie producers, photographers, architects, computer programmers, visual artists and designers of all types and indeed, the violation of the rights of all Nigerians.
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As we mark “No Music Day” across the country this September 1, COSON has also asked our thousands of members all over Nigeria and other stakeholders in the music industry to engage with the public through the mass media and by vigorous deployment of our immense social media handles to register our disdain for the widespread contempt for the rights of creative people in Nigeria.
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As we mark “No Music Day” today, we once again ask all Nigerians to seriously think about a world without music. What kind of world would that be?
Every year, in marking “No Music Day”, our key objective has been to engage the Nigerian people and the various governments on the potential contributions of Nigerian creativity to the development of the Nigerian nation and the necessity to fully deploy the substantial comparative advantage which our nation possesses in this area so as to provide hundreds of thousands of well-paying jobs to the teeming masses of Nigerian youth who parade the streets of our country almost hopelessly and which hopelessness invariably attracts them to become laborers in the devil’s workshop.
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Everywhere you go, the ingenuity of the Nigerian people continues to be on display. Our music, movies, literature, fashion, programming, and similar products of the creative endeavor are in substantial demand across the world. In the creative industry, Nigeria has significant comparative advantage. We are only asking for people who have the vision, the passion, and the understanding of the new world to be in the right positions to spark the fire and change the national narrative. We ask for an end to the period of the locust in Nigeria when poor leadership without vision has held our country down.
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In marking “No Music Day” 2022, we once again ask for a new Nigeria in which the people of wealth and influence are no longer those who have brazenly stolen the people’s wealth or scammed other people and tricked them out of what rightfully belongs to them. We ask for a Nigeria driven by knowledge and creativity. We want a nation where a creative songwriter can depend on his creativity and live well; a good performer does not have to worry about how to feed his family; a talented filmmaker or actor will not be burdened by where his next rent will come from; a gifted author can become a millionaire and does not have to sweat at the thought of his children’s school fees and a fashion designer with unique talent can be celebrated for his or her creativity. We ask for a Nigeria in which a great photographer can be a man of means; an architect does not also have to be a builder to earn commensurate income from his talent; an inventor can live off his invention and a creator of content can thrive from the deployment of his content.
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We earnestly ask for a Nigeria in which a lecturer is no longer ashamed to say that he teaches for a living. In other words, we demand a nation in which knowledge and creativity are celebrated.
For many years, some of us in the creative industries have continuously requested a proper engagement with the government so that we can unleash the burning latent energy of the creative geniuses that abound in our nation and to deploy that energy towards national development.
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Our theme for the 2022 “No Music Day” is: “MUSIC IN A SOCIETY ON THE ROAD TO A SOCIO-POLITICAL REVOLUTION”
We would all agree that a world without music should be likened to a graveyard. What is the greatest analgesic that cures the pain of our depression, anger and frustration? MUSIC!
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I must remind Nigerian musicians that our problems will not be solved until we stop the unnecessary bickering and fractionalization in our industry. It is the bickering and disunity that are exploited by those who have no real stake in our industry except to deploy divide and rule to milk us and keep us down. We must work together in the interest of our country and the young people who look towards us for guidance. We must understand that in a democracy, there will be alternative points of view. Each alternative view should not result in the setting up of an alternative faction.
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On this “No Music Day”, we continue to demand real change. We once again demand that the Nigerian nation addresses the following:
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1) Implement the Private Copy Levy scheme which after many years and repeated calls, has still not been implemented.
2) Ensure that necessary steps are taken to finally get the National Endowment Fund for the Arts operative to provide urgently needed resources to ensure the funding of creative projects in Nigeria.
3) Ensure that Government owned broadcasting stations and other government owned institutions are reminded that there is no provision under the law that exempts them from the payment of royalties for the musical content broadcast or deployed by them.
4) Ensure that the Nigerian Copyright Commission and other institutions of government pivot towards the effective implementation of anti-piracy measures in the digital environment which is where the bulk of piracy exists today.
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We believe that the time has come for our creative industry to go beyond simply providing entertainment to the public but playing a key role in nation building.
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We are saddened by the dangerous direction that our nation has been headed in recent times and the hopelessness that seems to engulf the citizens. We are saddened by the tribal and religious divisions, kidnappings, senseless killings, abductions, banditry, joblessness and the political and judicial rascality that sap the hope of our young people.
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We cannot afford to give up as a nation despite the immense disappointments we have faced. We must no longer leave our nation solely in the hands of our political job men who have shown frightening incapacity to move Nigeria forward and who are driving us to the precipice.
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All of Nigeria’s creative people must today fully engage in preventing Nigeria from becoming a wasted land destroyed by hatred and suspicion and the narrow tribal ambitions of a hand-full of people.
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On this “No Music Day”, we call on Nigeria’s musicians, actors, movie makers, writers, journalists, broadcasters, bloggers, intellectuals and all who operate in the creative space to deploy their talents and consciously work towards saving our people from impending doom.
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In consonance with our theme, “MUSIC IN A SOCIETY ON THE ROAD TO A SOCIO-POLITICAL REVOLUTION”, It must be our foremost responsibility now to unleash a lot of music, movies, programs, broadcasts, speeches, etc., that create an environment for stability, unity, justice, peace, rule of law and development in the Nigerian nation and stop the slide into anarchy and hopelessness.
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In building a new and better nation, creative people must play a central role, stand up, take responsibility, work together, establish the strong advocacy necessary in every democracy to create positive change.
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On this “No Music Day”, I call on every member of COSON and all other groups and associations in the Nigerian creative industry to make sure that during the forthcoming general elections, we deploy our PVCs to elect a government that respects the rights of creative people and respects the rule of law. That is the way to stop our nation from sliding into irreversible hopelessness.
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I make this broadcast from COSON House in Ikeja which is property that belongs 100% to the creative people of Nigeria and which shows what we can do when we work together. I wish to state that I am proud of the members of COSON, everywhere in Nigeria, our Board members, and the indefatigable Management team at COSON. COSON has continued to thrive because we have not allowed anyone to tear us apart which underlines the truism in the words, “United we stand, divided we fall”.
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The support of COSON members has been powerful, the unity within the Board is unrivaled and every working day, the Management team resumes at the ever-sparkling COSON House and makes sure that COSON is working, and all the key COSON processes are operating at international standard.
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I want to assure members of COSON that we have fought hard, and the period of the locust is almost at an end and that COSON will soon fully resume the distribution of royalties and benefits to our members across Nigeria.
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Every member of COSON should be proud that we have shown everyone that we can lawfully but vehemently refuse to be cowards and slaves in our country and we have proved that every Nigerian group, association, tribe or people can resist the attempt by the rampaging gang of economic and political marauders and vampires who want to appropriate everything that belongs to Nigerians to themselves and hold all of us to ransom and destroy our country to which God has endowed with everything that a country needs to be great.
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I assure the members of COSON that at the end of the day, we will have the last laugh as we create new, sweet music, dance and sing in harmony and with pride, let everybody hear those iconic words for which we are very well known, “Let the music pay!”
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God bless the Nigerian Creative Industry and God bless the great people of Nigeria.
CHIEF TONY OKOROJI:
September 1, 2022