Sir Jude Chika Nnam, (also referred to as Ancestor) has filed a N150m suit against against popular Nigerian musician, Kingsley Chinweike Okonkwo a.k.a Kcee, his brother Emeka Okonkwo, E-Money, and their record label Five Star Music for alleged copyright infringement.
The Plaintiff, a prolific Music composer, keyboardist and Choral Conductor who has also distinguished himself in the African Music terrain especially within the Catholic Church filed the suit with No: FHC/L/CS/304/202 at the Federal High Court Lagos seeking an order mandating the Defendants to render account of the incomes generated from the adaptation, production, distribution, sale, advertisement, marketing, and performance of the song titled “SOM TOO CHUKWU” from December 2020 till judgment and the sum of N150,000,000 as general damages. In addition to the above, he also sought both declaratory and injunctive others, among which are:
A declaration that the copyright, as well as the ownership rights to the song titled ‘SOM TOO CHUKWU’ which was surreptitiously included in the music album titled “CULTURAL PRAISE VOL.1 by the 3rd Defendant without the Plaintiff’s consent or authorization, is vested in the Plaintiff by Virtue of his composing the said song in the year 2001.
A declaration that the Defendants jointly and severally infringed on the copyright of the Plaintiff by adapting, producing, distributing, marketing, advertising and performing to the general public the song titled “SOM TOO CHUKWU ” without his consent or authorization (either written or oral).
Perpetual injunction retraining, preventing and or prohibiting the Defendants herein whether acting by themselves, or through their servants, agents, privies, legal representatives, or any other person howsoever described Acting for them and/or at their instance from infringing on the copyright of the plaintiff to the song titled “SOM TOO CHUKWU” by any means, however.
According to the court papers, the Plaintiff had through his counsel written to the Defendants on the infringement but got no response.
Recall that Kcee, released a music track titled “Cultural Praise” which featured an adaptation of the popular catholic song “som too Chukwu”; the song Sir Jude Nnam claims was composed by him.
The plaintiff is endorsed as a Yamaha artist for Keyboard products and is said to have composed thousands of original pieces and arrangements in several languages including in English, Igbo, Hausa, Yoruba, Bini, Efik, Swahili, Ashanti, Zulu, Hindu, Spanish, French and Chinese, etc.