A Federal High Court sitting in Lagos, on Monday, December 29, 2014, via suit no: FHC/L/CS/1987/14, granted an injunction restraining Cynthia Morgan, an artiste under the label of PSquare’s elder brother and manager, Jude Okoye (Northside Entertainment Ltd.) and all other agents, promoters, DJ’s, radio stations, TV stations, bloggers and every other person from publishing and distributing to the public the music track/single/album titled Popori by Cynthia Morgan, which is an alleged infringement on Queen Ure’s copyright.
The court order, among many other things, empowers Queen Ure to sue anyone in the business of recording, publishing, distributing to the public the music track/single/album titled Popori.
It would be recalled that Queen Ure’s first video which dropped in November 2012 was titled Porpori (a word she made up) and her 15 track album launched on December 29, 2012 is also titled Porpori. She equally dropped another “Porpori” video in March 2014 titled Porpori Dance, alongside other singles and videos. Before releasing Porpori, the Abia born daughter of former minister, Okezie had the sound recording registered at the Nigerian Copyright Commission and a copyright certificate was issued to her in March 2013. In November 2014, Cynthia Morgan who is signed under the Jude okoye – led Northside Entertainment released a single which she titled Popori and now the court has ordered her to relinquish the use of Popori as the title of her single.
Queen Ure says what she has done is nothing personal, but the preservation and protection of her intellectual property as well as her contribution to the music industry, so that artistes can begin to respect each other’s work and appreciate the act of registering their work so they can be protected in case of infringement.
The court order which has be applauded by music enthusiast across Nigeria is seen as a wakeup call to all artistes who engage in copyright infringement and even outright pirating of other artistes’ works without due authorization .
With this latest court judgment, any radio station, television stations, clubs etc that uses the work is liable and will be prosecuted.