Banderoles Have Been A Success - Copyright Administrator

Accra Twenty-three million banderoles have so far been sold out to musicians since the inception of the concept five years ago. Mrs Betty Mould-Iddrisu, Copyright Administrator, told GRi in an interview in Accra that 90 per cent went to locally recorded musical works. She said though the concept is not 100 per cent foolproof, its 85 per cent success has encouraged more than 20 countries, mainly African, to come to Ghana to study how it works. She said the world agency for the protection of literary works, having recognized the success of Ghana's system, will organize an African Regional Summit on it in July in Accra. The banderole system is operated by the Copyright Office, Copyright Society of Ghana, Association of Recording Industries, Musicians Union of Ghana, the Internal Revenue Service, which is in charge of sales, the Customs, Excise and Preventive Service and the Police, both in charge of monitoring and enforcement. Mrs Mould-Iddrisu said the concept was copied from Portugal where banderoles are affixed to the inlay cards of recorded cassettes. She said the Portuguese system has ensured "zero piracy" in the country and described Ghana as having the least musical piracy in Africa. She pointed out that apart from sound recordings, literary works including books, video films and maps fall under copyright protection but added that concentration is given to recorded music because it is the most pirated. Mrs Mould-Iddrisu said her office is considering expanding it to cover local and international video films, adding that more monitoring by the enforcement agencies could help increase the effectiveness of the system. The Copyright Administrator said the highest sale of 200,000 stickers of banderole locally has gone to Daddy Lumba, Kwadwo Antwi, Amakye Dede, Paapa Yankson and Yaw Sarpong, with the average sale for a hit song at between 50,000 and 100,000 stickers.