INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS AND THE NIGERIAN CREATIVE ECONOMY: MEASURING THE CONTRIBUTION OF COPYRIGHT INDUSTRIES

INTRODUCTION

Today, the creative economy is one of the most dynamic and transforming areas of the twenty-first century economic development. It is called the 'orange economy', the 'knowledge economy' or the 'culture economy' and can be defined as industries for which creativity, intellectual capacity and cultural expression are their main inputs and outputs. This economy is underpinned by a legal framework called intellectual property rights (IPR), specifically copyright, which serves as the legal framework that supports the built, sustained and monetised economy of the creative industries. Copyright gives authors and creators a package of exclusive rights to reproduce, distribute, perform, broadcast, adapt, and communicate to the public their created works, which leads to the economic incentive framework for investment in creative production.

The film, music, publishing, broadcasting, software and visual arts industries are among the more important and rapidly expanding sectors of copyright industries in Nigeria. Nollywood is the second-largest film industry in the world, Afrobeats is a global cultural phenomenon that has transformed the international music industry and Nigeria's technology industry has become a leader in the venture capital investment class on the African continent. These sectors make up billions of naira to the gross domestic product (GDP) and employ millions of Nigerians, formal and informal, along the creative value chain.

The Nigerian Copyright Act,[1] as substantially reformed by the Copyright Act 2022,[2] provides the primary legislative framework governing copyright protection in Nigeria. The Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC),[3] established under the Act, is the principal regulatory body charged with the administration and enforcement of copyright law. The 2022 Act represents the most comprehensive overhaul of Nigerian copyright law in decades, introducing provisions on digital rights, technological protection measures, internet service provider liability, and the formal recognition of moral rights, among other innovations.

Even though the Nigerian legislation and policy is relatively sophisticated, the system continues to experience several issues that hinder the complete realization of the economic potential of the creative industries. So many people are involved in both physical and cyber piracy to rob rights holders of significant revenue. Collective management organizations are poorly resourced and have poor reach. Judicial enforcement is challenged due to having too many cases in the court system and not enough advancement in the number of specialists. Economic/ copyright ownership knowledge among the public is sadly poor. In addition, there is a lack of reliable, standardized data to support evidence-based policies in copyright industries.

The subject of this task is the role of copyright industries in the creative economy that will be discussed with the following thematic discussion points: The legal framework, the movie industry (Nollywood), music industry, publishing and literary works, software and digital copyright, and enforcement issues. Based on judicially decided decisions, legal provisions, instruments from international community and data, the assignment holds that copyright industries contribute in a formidable and ever increasing way to Nigeria's economy but realising their potentiality requires continuous legislative, institutional and attitudinal reform.

THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR COPYRIGHT IN NIGERIA

1.1 Historical Development

Nigeria's copyright jurisprudence has evolved over more than a century. The earliest copyright legislation applicable to Nigeria was the Copyright Act 1911 of the United Kingdom, which was extended to Nigeria as a colonial territory. Upon independence in 1960, Nigeria inherited this framework until the enactment of its first indigenous Copyright Act in 1970.[4] The 1970 Act was itself replaced by the Copyright Act 1988, which established the Nigerian Copyright Council (later reconstituted as the Nigerian Copyright Commission), introduced more comprehensive protections, and aligned Nigerian law more closely with international standards.[5] The Copyright Act Cap. C28, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 2004 was a consolidation of the 1988 Act as amended, and remained the primary legislation until the Copyright Act 2022.

1.2 The Copyright Act 2022

The Copyright Act 2022 extends protection to literary works, musical works, artistic works, cinematograph films, sound recordings, and broadcasts.[6] Protection is automatic upon the creation and fixation of an original work; no registration is required. The duration of protection for most works is the life of the author plus seventy years  a term consistent with the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works 1886, to which Nigeria acceded in 1993,[7] and with international best practice under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement) 1994.

The Act vests copyright in the author as the first owner, subject to specific exceptions. Where a literary, artistic, or musical work is made by an author in the course of employment, the employer is the first owner of copyright unless there is an agreement to the contrary. Similarly, where a work is commissioned, copyright vests in the commissioner unless agreed otherwise. These provisions have significant practical implications for the creative industries, particularly in the context of works created by employees of media houses, publishing companies, and technology firms.

1.3 Foundational Judicial Decisions

A landmark case that shaped the understanding of copyright ownership in Nigeria is Afolabi v Apex Books Ltd[8] (2003) 3 NWLR (Pt 807) 1, where the Supreme Court of Nigeria affirmed the doctrine of authorship and original creation as the bedrock of copyright subsistence. The Court held that copyright vests automatically in the author upon the creation of an original work without any need for registration, and that the author's moral right to be identified as creator is distinct from and survives any transfer of economic rights.

In Dim v Ohiabor[9] (2002) 10 NWLR (Pt 776) 508, the Court of Appeal affirmed that originality in the copyright sense does not require novelty or invention, but merely that the work must originate from the author and not be slavishly copied from another source. This interpretation is consistent with the standard adopted in the seminal English authority of University of London Press Ltd v University Tutorial Press Ltd[10] [1916] 2 Ch 601, where Peterson J held that 'the word 'original' does not in this connection mean that the work must be the expression of original or inventive thought' but only that 'the work must not be copied from another work'.[11]

1.4 Digital Provisions and International Alignment

The 2022 Act introduced more robust provisions on digital rights management, technological protection measures (TPMs), and internet service provider (ISP) liability  reflecting the realities of the digital creative economy.[12] The Act's provisions on TPMs prohibit the circumvention of effective technical measures used by rights holders to control access to or copying of their works, and create civil and criminal liability for devices or services primarily designed to circumvent such measures. These innovations place Nigeria in better alignment with the WIPO Copyright Treaty 1996 and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty 1996, though Nigeria is yet to ratify both instruments.

According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), the economic contribution of copyright industries globally averages between 5% and 12% of GDP in developed economies.[13] WIPO's World Intellectual Property Report 2022 noted that copyright-intensive industries are among the fastest-growing segments of modern economies, driven by digitalisation and the global expansion of cultural markets.[14] In Nigeria, preliminary assessments by the NCC suggest that copyright-based industries contribute approximately 3–5% of GDP,[15] a figure regarded as a significant underestimate given the informality of large segments of the creative economy and the persistent under-reporting of income within them.