PLEASE DON’T SET UP A CMO! Tony Okoroji warns

SATURDAY BREAKFAST with TONY OKOROJI

YOU WANT TO BE RICH? PLEASE DON’T SET UP A CMO! Chief Tony Okoroji Warns those who wants to get rich by any means.

This week, on the 20th of May 2020, we celebrated the 10th anniversary of the official take-off of the operations of COSON which has become Nigeria’s must successful and most admired copyright Collective Management Organization (CMO).

On the same 20th of May, we marked the 3rd anniversary of the commissioning of the COSON House in Ikeja which continues to sparkle and which my communications team does not talk about without prefixing with the adjective, “magnificent”.

Yes, we always wish to remind everyone that there is not one Naira of government money in the acquisition and construction of the “magnificent COSON House”, no donor dollar or pound came from anywhere and that we acquired, built and equipped COSON House with no bank loan and no debt of any type. The sparkling national green colour of COSON House tends to suggest to some people that it is federal government property. No! COSON has never received any type of money from the government.

Fired up by our exhilarating slogan, “let the music pay!”, COSON has in its ten years of operation, distributed hundreds of millions of Naira as royalties to its members and affiliates. Just recently in April 2020, even with the major bank accounts of COSON frozen and the issues in court, COSON in a responsive and responsible manner reacted to the suffering of its thousands of members across the country under the pressure of the COVID 19 lockdown. The society became the first Nigerian institution to provide anti Coronavirus palliatives to its members at a time of great need. At first, =N=50 million was approved by the COSON Board for this purpose. An additional =N=22.5 million was later approved. The distribution has been done in a very structured, professional and transparent manner which has been widely celebrated by members of COSON and others.

You know what? Now, everybody wants to set up a CMO! In the typical Nigerian fashion, all the people who want to make quick money think that they can replicate COSON. They want to turn the very complex system of collective management of copyright into their new “pure water” business in which everyone has his own cheap cellophane designs littering the streets.

Not too long ago, I was President of PMAN. With a driven team, clear vision and never-say-die passion, I worked 25 hours every day, eight days a week, to make PMAN a glorious national brand. Everyone across the world, from the President of the Federal Republic, governors, ambassadors and stars of all colours wanted to associate and rub shoulders with PMAN. PMAN became a much-admired name and the toast of the nation. And the dam broke!

Every musician in Nigeria who could afford a tokunbo SUV began to see himself as President of PMAN. To be PMAN President became the burning ambition of a lot. At some point, there were four people simultaneously calling themselves PMAN President! With all due respect, none of them understood the vision or the mission. PMAN is a registered trade union but none of the ‘Presidents’ had ever read the Trade Union Act or even the PMAN constitution. We all can see where it has led PMAN.

In my service to the creative industry in our nation, I have always been driven by those almost forgotten words, “together we stand, divided we fall”. The strength of PMAN came from the bringing together of diverse people across Nigeria to share in one vision. I toured nearly every nook and cranny of Nigeria to make that possible. It required an incredible amount of work, loads and loads of battles and heaps and heaps of personal sacrifice. Everywhere, I had to know what I was talking about. So, I had to study everyday and study very hard. Take it from me, there is nothing worse than an ignorant leader.

Either as President of PMAN or Chairman of COSON, I have never gone into a meeting or discussions without first getting a good grasp of the relevant laws, the rules, the issues, the statistics or the trends. I believe that every great leader must remain a student through his tenure with the appetite to learn as much as possible. I wish to repeat that there is nothing worse than an ignorant leader.

I have repeatedly told people that you can never become rich by doing the kind of work that I do. What drives you must be the genuine love of people and not the love of self. You can never build a great trade union or an outstanding CMO if you are driven by self interest or the interest of you and your handful of friends. When you lead a CMO, you work for others and not for self.

I see all the people positioning themselves to launch new CMOs in Nigeria and ask myself whether they truly understand what it takes to make a CMO work. Do they know how many years of study, work and patience it has taken COSON to be where it is? Do they have the requisite technical knowledge? Do they know how many court cases that litter the road COSON has had to travel? Do they think that there is anyone out there with bags of money waiting to give to them just upon their asking? Do they think that there would be no new arguments, quarrels or disagreements within whatever contraptions they have in mind?

I look around and I see all the people who not long ago thought they would become super rich by becoming PMAN President and I ask, “how did it pan out guys?”

That is why I say that setting up a CMO is not pure water business. If you want to be rich?... Please, don’t set up a CMO!

Chief Tony Okoroji says Thank you

10 YEARS OF THE COSON EXPERIENCE: THANK YOU EVERYONE FOR YOUR SUPPORT

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO COSON

On this 20th day of May 2020, we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the official take-off of the operations of Copyright Society of Nigeria (COSON) which has become Nigeria’s must successful and most admired copyright collective management organization.

When we began our journey on May 20, 2010, very few people gave us any chance of success. We had been told, over and over again, that collective management of copyright would never work in Nigeria and that the Nigerian creative industry lacked the discipline to build the stable and complex institution required to make collective management a success. With very focused leadership and fired up by our slogan, “let the music pay!”, COSON has broken that tough jinx and has built an institution that works.

From Day 1, we have kept strictly to every rule in the book and complied with every law of our nation. For ten years, we never missed one Annual General Meeting and every year, we have had our AGM in the month of May, the month we celebrate our take-off. At each of our AGMs, we have invited a cross section of the media to follow and report our very open discussions and deliberations. Transparency has been our watchword and we had our meetings in the open because at COSON we have never had anything to hide. Indeed, apart from the statutorily prescribed Annual General Meeting, we also held an Extra-Ordinary General Meeting every December at which our members had an open opportunity to discuss every issue. The COSON Board had fixed a date for the 2020 COSON Annual General Meeting this May in the COSON tradition. Unfortunately, because of the COVID 19 restrictions, the AGM would have to be held on another date.
Without the prompting of anyone, the COSON accounts have been audited every single year by auditors appointed by our Annual General Meetings as required by the Companies & Allied Matters Act (CAMA). We have had the audited accounts reviewed and approved by our AGM as required by law and filed each annual return with the Corporate Affairs Commission and sent an activity report made up of hundreds of pages every year to the NCC. Without any question, COSON has been the most transparent and accountable organization in the history of the Nigerian creative industry.
When the COSON House was commissioned exactly three years ago, a lot of people were surprised that there was not one Naira of government money in the acquisition and construction of this magnificent building, no donor dollar or pound came from anywhere and that we acquired, built and equipped COSON House with no bank loan and no debt of any type. COSON has never received any money from the government.
For ten years, except for one month, the month of December 2018 when all the COSON bank accounts were mysteriously frozen without notice, not one of the highly trained staff of COSON has received his or her salary one day late. It is also a fact that no COSON member has ever paid any registration fee, monthly dues or subscription of any type to COSON yet every COSON member is entitled to some income from us every year.
In its ten years of operation, COSON has distributed hundreds of millions of Naira as royalties to its members and affiliates. In April 2020, even with the major bank accounts of COSON still frozen and the issues in court, COSON in a responsive and responsible manner reacted to the suffering of its thousands of members across the country under the pressure of the COVID 19 lockdown. The society became the first Nigerian institution to provide such palliatives to its members at a time of great need. At first, =N=50 million was approved by the COSON Board for this purpose. An additional =N=22.5 million was later approved. The distribution has been done in a very structured, professional and transparent manner which has been widely celebrated by members of COSON.
We are very proud of the success that COSON has achieved which is a product of the leadership’s laser focused dedication to defending the interest and welfare of our members and the deft management of our resources.
Unfortunately, the COSON outstanding success also became our albatross. As it has become clear that we have broken the jinx and built an organization which across the continent is being celebrated, several midnight plots and gang-ups began to emerge. All kind of plots have been hatched to hijack for a few people COSON which we have built as a pan-Nigerian organization to provide succor to all owners of musical works and sound recordings in every nook and cranny of the Nigerian nation. All kinds of false stories have been manufactured and spread to tarnish the image of our great organization. Fortunately, despite all the stones thrown at COSON, our organization continues to stand firm. Despite the many attempts to derail COSON, our organization continues to stand strong, proving the fact that the Nigerian creative industry finally has an institution with roots strong enough to withstand the rascality that has caused our industry great instability and destroyed creative industry institutions in our country.
This success is not just due to the leadership but also to the membership which has overwhelmingly shown unflinching support to COSON and those of our licensees and partners who have continued to pledge their faith in COSON.
As we commence a new stage of our journey, COSON has announced key changes in the management of the society with Ms. Bernice Eriemeghe, a well-trained and experienced professional accountant taking over as General Manager from Mr. Chinedu Chukwuji. This transition has been done in a very friendly manner with strong camaraderie and warmth, once again proving the maturity of the leadership available to COSON.
Going forward, the COSON Board has directed the management team to be laser focused on making COSON a first class international organization driven by data, digital technology, transparency and accountability with the clear objective being the happiness and well-being of our members and other stakeholders.
I have no doubt that once again we will deliver and make the members of COSON proud. We will also make all Nigerians who appreciate good things in our country happy.

My heartfelt thanks to all of you.

CHIEF TONY OKOROJI
Chairman, COSON
May 20, 2020

HOW OKOROJI SHARED THE =N=200,000 HE COLLECTED FROM EFE OMOROGBE

EXCLUSIVE!!!

HOW OKOROJI SHARED THE =N=200,000 HE COLLECTED FROM EFE OMOROGBE

It will be recalled that Justice Josephine  Oyefeso of the High Court of Lagos State in Ikeja, last year ordered Artiste Manager, Efe Omorogbe of Now Muzik to pay COSON Chairman, Chief Tony Okoroji a total of =N=200,000.00 as cost for truncating  trial in two undefended defamation cases brought by Chief Okoroji against Omorogbe. Just as the trials were about to begin in Justice Oyefeso’s court, Omorogbe’s lawyer rushed to court to beg the judge to suspend the trial so that Omorogbe could file defence to the suits.

For over 9 months, Mr. Omorogbe struggled, failed or neglected to pay the money prompting Okoroji’s lawyers to write to him warning him that if he did not pay the money within two weeks, Garnishee proceedings would be commenced to levy execution on Omorogbe’s property over the debt. As a result, Efe Omorogbe rushed to pay the sum of =N=200,000.00 to the account of Whitedove Solicitors, lawyers to Chief Tony Okoroji.

Unknown to many, the =N=200,000.00 was treated as war bounty at COSON House and Okoroji’s TOPS Ltd, both in Ikeja and among Chief Okoroji’s friends and relations. To many of Okoroji’s people, the money was seen as appetizer in what they consider to be the fruits of a main dish of damages to come as a price for  Omorogbe’s audacity to organize a failed ‘coup’ against the man considered by many to be his mentor and friend and the attempt to widely rubbish the name and character of the most respected former president of PMAN.

Tony Okoroji, the master of copyright royalty distribution, took the position that the money did not belong to him but to the many people who have stood by him in the war declared against him by the Efe Omorogbe led gang.

A source close to Chief Okoroji says that over one hundred people got a share of the Efe Omorogbe ‘loot’. Among those said to have got a piece of the action are Okoroji’s wife, his driver and housekeeper and every member of the COSON Board. On the day the members of the COSON staff got their share of the money, there was wide jubilation at COSON House. In unison, they thundered out the COSON mantra, “let the music pay!” Thereafter, some of the staff spent their money on recharge cards, others on pepper soup and drinks. At Okoroji’s TOPS Ltd, the scene was repeated. We are also informed that several of Okoroji’s close friends such as Patrick Doyle and his fiery lawyer and friend, Mr. James Ononiwu, did not miss out in the bonanza.

Said our source, “you will be surprised that some journalists got their own share of the money and so did some staff of the NCC who are pretending to be fighting Chief Tony Okoroji. ‘Presido’ did not spend one naira of the money on himself. I am not sure that he is interested in Efe Omorogbe’s money. I believe he just wants Efe Omorogbe to learn a bitter lesson”.

P.M Walker for TOPS

Culled from dailynewscover.com