Sub-Saharan Africa Gets Anti-Piracy Body

LOS ANGELES/PARIS: The new Africa Media Rights Watch initiative, an anti-piracy body monitoring the region, will officially launch next year at the fifth edition of DISCOP Africa.

The initiative is supported by leading broadcasters and content suppliers involved in Sub-Saharan Africa, such as Canal+ Overseas, M-Net and Cote Ouest, as well as by African associations of broadcasters and content producers. The anti-piracy body’s objective is to help establish and promote a business environment that is respectful of copyright laws and of measures to enforce these laws.

Africa Media Rights Watch will officially launch on February 11, 2001, during the fifth edition of DISCOP Africa, in Accra, Ghana.

Commenting on the Africa Media Rights Watch initiative, Bernard Azria, the founding manager of Cote Ouest, noted, “It is vital that the problem of piracy be eliminated, or at least significantly reduced in Sub-Saharan Africa. If the theft of intellectual property is allowed to continue at its present levels it will be a very severe blow to the possibility of building a flourishing audiovisual business with a secure long-terms future in the region.”

Benedicte Cheneut, the general manager of Canal+ Overseas, agreed, “For all those legitimately concerned with the audiovisual business in Sub-Saharan Africa, content piracy is robbing them of their future. We have to put an end to this theft, and we will.”

Mike Dearham, the head of sales and acquisitions at M-NET, commented, “It is not enough merely to frame rules, it is also necessary to construct a mechanism capable of ensuring that the rules are enforced.”

Patrick Jucaud, the founding manager of the DISCOP organization, added, “As the only market at which the continent’s entire audiovisual business gathers, DISCOP Africa has a key role to play in providing the means for all the major players of Sub-Saharan Africa to unite and defeat the pirates, and we are very pleased to host the launch of the Africa Media Rights Watch initiative”.