Nana Ampadu suspended from MUSIGA

Accra, Aug. 22, GNA - Nana Kwame Ampadu and Mr. C. K. Morrison, both veteran highlife musicians and members of the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA), have been suspended indefinitely from the union.

"The NEC in consultation with the National Executive Council, the highest body of MUSIGA, has on this day 21st August, 2008 passed a resolution to suspend indefinitely the two executives from MUSIGA," a statement made available to the Ghana News Agency on Friday said. Until their suspension, Nana Ampadu was the General Secretary of MUSIGA and C. K. Morrison was the Welfare Officer.


The statement signed by Mrs Diana Hopeson, President of MUSIGA, said the two were suspended for forming a separate collecting society outside of MUSIGA and for undermining the efforts of MUSIGA to wind the existing one, Copyright Society of Ghana (COSGA) and form a new collecting society, a group formed to collect royalties from musicians.


It noted that the behaviour of the two amounted to conflict of interests and a violation of Article 20, Section A and B of the MUSIGA constitution, which prohibited members of MUSIGA from being members of other musician unions or collecting societies not affiliated to MUSIGA.


Article 20, Section A of the MUSIGA Constitution reads: "No MUSIGA member, shall be permitted to hold membership in any union of musicians not affiliated with the MUSIGA, or in any other organization, association of musicians or collecting society that has goals or engages in a pattern of conduct undermining or weakening the legitimate interest or the MUSIGA, or any affiliated antiquated."


Section B states:" Any members violating the provision of this section shall be subject to expulsion."

The statement ordered the two to return all official MUSIGA documents in their possession to the MUSIGA head office by close of Monday August 25, 2008.


It noted that prior to their suspension, a query letter was served to them to draw their attention to the effect of their action.


A NEC meeting was subsequently held to caution them but they went ahead to form the new collecting society and publicly declared their stand on national TV.


Mrs Hopeson told the GNA that following the passage of the new copyright law, MUSIGA, then under the presidency of Alhaji Sidiku Buari, registered a new collecting society under the name Musicians Copyright Society of Ghana (MCOSGA) to replace the existing one, COSGA.


She said the process of winding up COSGA was still ongoing and both Nana Ampadu and C. K. Morrison were actively involved in the process until they decided to form their own collecting society outside MUSIGA.

"We have tried on several occasions to persuade them to desist from their actions but they have turned deaf ear to our concerns and rather resorted to picking ideas from discussions at our meetings and implementing them in their parochial society," she said.


Mrs Hopeson also used the opportunity to clear the air about the political twist being put on the real reasons why Nana Ampadu and C. K. Morrison had been at loggerheads with the MUSIGA executive, saying that their suspension had nothing to do with their publicized affiliation to the ruling New Patriotic Party.


"It is funny how they go round claiming that we want to sack them because they belong to NPP and the rest of the executive belong to NDC," she said.


At the recent mammoth rally of the ruling NPP in Takoradi, Nana Ampadu was one of the several musicians who mounted the platform and openly campaigned for the party's candidates.


When GNA reached Nana Ampadu on phone he described the suspension as mere victimization and that there was no constitutional basis for the actions by the MUSIGA executive.

He explained that when Alhaji Sidiku Buari registered the MCOSGA as a private entity, none of the MUSIGA executive members challenged him and he was never accused of undermining MUSIGA.


"The last time I checked, MCOSGA was still a private company owned by the former president of MUSIGA, so what is wrong with me and other copyright owners also forming a society to protect our intellectual property," he said.


Nana Ampadu said he would issue an appropriate response to MUSIGA very soon, saying that his society is not another musicians union but a collecting society similar to what Sidiku Buari established privately.