The Founder and Executive Director of Kaduna International Film Festival, Audu Isreal Kashim has said that globalisation of films have brought technology improvement, diversification and working together with other countries which has increased awareness, brought profits to Nigeria and influenced on how films are been made.
Kashim, made it known during the 6th Kaduna International Film Festival event with the themed; “Globalization of Film And Its Impact On The World”.
He urged the government to go tough on pirates and copyright infringers, as movie producers are running at lose.
“As am speaking to you now, pirates begins the sales of an abridged version of blockbuster movie, titled Jagun-Jagun, recently produced by Femi Adeboyo on the street, at the rate of N250 to N500 per copy” he stated.
He appealed to Federal Government to save the million dollar film industry from collapsing.
“We need government to come to our rescue. We spend millions on film production and we need to make our money back. The laws protecting creativity is under the copyright commission and they need to add more sanctions to those who are found wanting in this copyright infringement. Once there is strong infringment penalty, it will help” he added.
Kashim who called on government at all levels to support the film industry and film festival organizers so that the rich culture of Nigeria can be projected to the world, also identified tourism as of the key sector that grows a nation’s GDP, citing Dubai as an example of nations with tourist attraction.
The Director General of Nigerian Copyright Commission, Dr John Atseyin, said the copyright act is now enriched with stiffer sanctions against intellectual property theft, to protect creators.
Represented by Mrs susan Bashorun, Director Nigerian Copyright Commission kaduna, the Diretor General of NCC said “the new copyright act is very rich. The penalty has been upgraded. Gone are the days when a pirate will be asked to pay one N1000 and there in the court, he will throw the N1000 and work away. No the penalty is high now.
“We have an online unit in our operation office called OCI, what this particular section does is to investigate online content. We cannot on our own start lokling for online content if you dont come and report the theft. Then after investigation by OCI, when there is need or prima facie, they will set up a casw file and take you to court.
“For every copy infringrd is 10,000 and then the imprisonment is not 3 months anymore. It is five years. It is not business as usual anymore. And them the judges have been trained on matters concerning this issues.
“To the evil doers, its no longer business as usual. The slegde hammer of law will fall on you. If you are high and mighty, you have to face the law,” the DG said.