PRESS RELEASE: MUSIC INDUSTRY COALITION TO MEET FASHOLA OVER ALABA – It will be recalled that the coalition has also requested President Umar Musa Yar’ Adua to direct the Inspector-General of Police to serve a warning to the traders at Alaba International Market in Lagos to get rid of the pirates among them or have the market shut down
As part of its current national drive to reposition the music industry in Nigeria, the Nigerian Music Industry Coalition has written to Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State seeking a meeting.
The coalition’s drive which includes an unprecedented anti-piracy campaign was launched at a press conference in Lagos on July 15. Since then, the coalition has held a major rally in Lagos, promoted both a hunger strike and no music day campaigns with significant media presence across the nation. It has also held a series of meetings with government officials in Abuja.
In a two page letter signed by Mr. Efe Omorogbe, a leader of the coalition, Governor Fashola was informed of ‘an urgent need to address the debilitating amount of piracy in Lagos State especially the infamous situation in Alaba International Market which has gained the world wide notoriety of being an international hot bed of piracy’
It will be recalled that the coalition has also requested President Umar Musa Yar’ Adua to direct the Inspector-General of Police to serve a warning to the traders at Alaba International Market in Lagos to get rid of the pirates among them or have the market shut down.
The coalition made up of Performing Musicians Employers Association of Nigeria (PMAN), Nigerian Association of Recording Industries (NARI), Performing & Mechanical Rights Society Ltd/Gte (PMRS), Association of Music Business Professionals (AM.B-Pro), Music Label Owners & Recording Industries Association of Nigeria (MORAN), Music Label Owners Association of Nigeria (MULOAN,), Gramophone Records & Cassette Dealers (AGRECD), Music Advertisers Association Of Nigeria (MAAN).
Audio /Video CD Sellers Association of Nigeria (AVCDSAN) has also reminded the Federal Government that Nigeria faces the danger ofinternational sanctions because of the glaring failure to meet the nation’s obligations under the different conventions and treaties signed by our country to protect intellectual property rights of citizens of other nations which are wantonly infringed upon in Nigeria alongside those of Nigerian nationals.
Efe Omorogbe
For: The Nigerian Music Industry Coalition