Music Pirates Strike Again

- Kojo Antwi is the latest victim Music pirates are at it again. There is currently a CD of Kojo Antwi's latest album, Densu, selling on the streets of Accra for as low as 3O, OOO instead of the ¢75,000 that the original goes for.

Although the pirates have tried to make their copies look as close as the original CDs one can easily detect the difference. Where as the genuine work has a three-fold paper card for the CD case, the pirated work comes in a normal plastic case.

What is supposed to be an inlay card happens to be some paper with the inscription Densu on it neither does it come with the lyrics of the songs on the album that can be seen on the original work. The CDs do not also come with the anti-piracy security device known as gamugram.

“We are not aware of this particular one”, said Mr. Alfred Kumi Atiemo, Public Relations Director at the Office of the Copyright Administrator when Showbiz contacted him last Tuesday. “But we know about works of popular Ghanaian artistes which have been pirated in the past”

Mr. Kumi-Atiemo said the new album of Daddy Lumba was recently also pirated and the perpetrator of that crime was prosecuted at the Madina Community Tribunal and having been found guilty he was handed a six months jail sentence. He also said they had information which, though has not been confirmed, has it that Amakye Dede's latest album has also been pirated. “It is an allegation and therefore we are yet to confirm it or make any arrests.”

Mr. Atiemo also revealed that twelve vendors who were arrested last January have been remanded in custody by a Kaneshie Magistrate Court to appear again on February 26.

Inspite of these arrests and allegations of piracy, Mr. Kumi Atiemo said the Copyright Office does not have many problems with the piracy of cassettes.

“Cases of piracy of cassettes are minimal. This is because cassettes are manufactured by the plants in Accra and Kumasi and the Copyright Office can monitor them.”

“Piracy of works on cassettes is not large”, he said.

Showbiz investigations have confirmed that the pirated CDs are manufactured in Far East countries such as Singapore and then shipped to Lome from where they find their way into Ghana.

Mr. Atiemo said the Copyright Office is very worried by the practice of piracy and appealed to the public to help them fight it. “We are fighting piracy but we are limited because it is not the only thing we do here. That is why we often rely on the public to be able to execute the job well.' He said it is to help fight piracy that the Copyright Office introduced the gamugram and other security devices in the past.

“Most of the top musicians in Ghana believe in the gamugram and they have been patronizing it. Lumba, Kojo Antwi, Amakye Dede among others. If you look through the files of Kojo Antwi you would find out that over the last three months he has been buying gamugram at a minimum of ten thousand per week. Would he have done that if he did not believe in it?” He called on all musicians to accept the gamugram as it is in their interest to do so.