NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 24 — The National Assembly has passed the Copyright Amendment Bill which will give copyright holders and artistes an upper hand in negotiations and establishment of a new formula for sharing of revenue with telecom companies.
Acting Finance and National Committee Chairman Mark Nyamita and Dagoretti South MP John Kiarie moved a further amendment to fix the share of generated of the net revenue from the sale of ring back tunes, to the artiste or owner of the copyright at not less than fifty two per cent.
“What I am attempting to do is give enough lee-way for the artists as they go to negotiate and to have enough maneuver space,” Kiarie explained.
Homa Bay County Woman Representative Gladys Wanga added; “the other thing that encouraged me is when Safaricom came to us and said for example that if the technology price remained lower, the artiste is not tied to 52 percent the artiste can add to 55 or 60 percent.”
“Not putting a static figure is better than putting a moving figure because scale means more margins,” stated Kiharu MP Ndindi Nyoro.
Minority Whip Emmanuel Wangwe (Navakholo) said: “What we are simply doing is cushioning the artiste not to suffer returns on their investment.”
Currently the formula provides that only 16 per cent of the net revenue generated goes to artistes from the Skiza music platform, with 25 per cent going to the taxman and 51 per cent retained by Safaricom.
MPs also passed a further amendment that will allow artistes/copyright holders to be directly received their share of the revenue.
Nyamita explained that amendment came after an artiste reported to the Committee that they are having big problems with the collection agencies, the CBOs and the PRSPs and so on.
“An artiste said they had not received payments, for an estimated eight months, but now we have specified the percentage which Safaricom say it okay, to ensure that the money gets to them because of time value for money,” he stated.
“The person we are trying to protect here is the artist, because there is a lot of money politics within the CBOs that if asked, the artiste would gladly collect their money directly from the platform owner in order to reduce the broken telephone that is between the tripartite players,” Kiarie said in his submission.
The House did away with Wanga’s amendments which sought to repeal internet service providers (ISPs) liability provisions and the procedure for notice and take-down.
“The amendments are not progressive, they are retrogressive therefore we cannot carry them in a bill that is meant to protect artists,” Wanga, who withdrew her amendments, told the MPs during the Committee of the Whole House.
“I am extremely happy that Gladys Wanga saying that she had a monkey on her back but she did not know who owned that monkey. I am glad she has shed that monkey and today we will be happy to pass this knowing that Section 35 shall not be touched,” Kiarie added.
