Textile piracy: Police to begin prosecution

The Ghana Police Service will soon start prosecuting traders dealing in pirated Ghanaian textile designs.

This follows the seizure of fake textiles from some traders in Ghana’s market centres and border crossings.

To help build a strong case against the pirates, the Ghana Standards Authority has been asked to verify the designs to establish whether they indeed belong to local manufacturing firms.

Some traders claimed ownership of some of the designs after the anti-piracy task force confiscated their textiles.

General Secretary of the Textiles, Garment and Leather Workers Union (TEGLU), Abraham Koomson, speaking to Class Business, confirmed moves to prosecute the traders.

“We are pushing that they prosecute these people, so the police is preparing the docket for court. The lawyer is saying that for them to be sure that we own the designs, they want us to get the [Ghana] Standards Authority; there is a vetting committee which vets the designs imported. Those who want to import any fabric will need to go through them for them to check whether the design you want to bring to Ghana is not owned by any local manufacturer. So, the police want us to get the [Ghana] Standards Authority to confirm whether what the local manufacturers are saying is the truth. So, I have a collection of the samples from the local manufacturers and the pirated ones, [and] I am sending them to the place with a letter for them to work on it,”