Nollywood filmmaker Tony Abulu has spoken about the years he spent fighting film piracy for Nigeria's creative industry, saying the work cost him time and personal money and earned him no thanks. He was responding to a statement on the need for Nollywood to do more about digital piracy.
Abulu said the effort began in 2005, when he organised the first bilateral copyright conference between the United States and Nigeria, a three day event at the Nigerian Embassy in Washington DC. He flew in Barrister Adebambo Adewopo, then Director General of the Nigerian Copyright Commission. Also present, he said, were officials from the Nigerian Department of Justice and its American counterpart, the head of the US copyright authority, the head of the Motion Picture Association of America and the head of the US border patrol.
The Americans responded with two offers, Abulu said. The first was the support of Public Interest Intellectual Property Advisors, known as PIIPA, along with pro bono attorneys to litigate cases. The second was a team of seven senior American copyright attorneys, who normally charge $300 an hour, to fly to Nigeria for five weeks. They would work with the Department of Justice, help update what he described as the country's archaic copyright law, and train magistrates and lawyers on copyright law and infringement litigation. All of it would be free, he said. The attorneys asked only for accommodation and feeding while in Nigeria. Abulu said a Nigerian justice official told him the department did not have the budget, and the offer went nowhere.
His own experience with American lawyers was different. When his film Crazy Like a Fox was stolen in the United States, he said, PIIPA gave him three top pro bono attorneys who helped him settle the case out of court. He added that most Nollywood films are not copyrighted in the United States, which leaves them with little protection there. As president of the Filmmakers Association of Nigeria, USA, he said he copyrighted more than 200 films in the country and organised a raid on pirated Nollywood titles in Brooklyn with the help of Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes, which ended in arrests.
"My brother, I don tire," Abulu said. "I spent so much time and personal money on Nollywood and the creative industry. Not a single thank you."
Abulu is a US based producer, director and writer, chief executive of Black Ivory Communications and president of FAN USA. His films include Back to Africa, American Dream, Crazy Like a Fox and Doctor Bello, which screened in 20 AMC cinemas across the United States in February 2013 and was partly funded by the Nigerian government, according to a report at the time. In a December 2003 interview, he said FAN USA planned to take power of attorney over filmmakers' works so it could litigate copyright infringement on their behalf.
PIIPA is a US nonprofit founded in 2002 that connects volunteer intellectual property lawyers with people who cannot afford them. According to WIPO Magazine, it worked with FAN USA and the African Artists Collaborative from 2008 on an anti piracy campaign called Operation NAP. The campaign registered more than 100 African films in the United States, got infringing material removed from more than 50 websites and sent cease and desist letters to American stores. The magazine reported that the revenues of three legitimate distributors rose by 20 per cent.
The Brooklyn action came in November 2010, when Hynes launched Operation Nollywood. Foreign Policy and CBS New York reported that his office seized more than 10,000 counterfeit DVDs from nine stores, mostly in Flatbush. Foreign Policy reported that Abulu, as president of FAN, had asked Hynes to act and spoke at the announcement, saying: "The sweat and blood of Africa, both on the continent and in the U.S., will not go to waste."
Adewopo served as Director General of the Nigerian Copyright Commission from 2004 to 2010, according to Open AIR. In May 2005, a US Embassy cable recorded that the Commission had launched an anti piracy programme called STRAP, Strategic Action Against Piracy, and warned that lack of funding could leave it ineffective against what it called Nigeria's active pirating industry.
The law of that period has since changed. The Copyright Act 2022 repealed the earlier Act, and the debate has moved from pirated DVDs on a Brooklyn street to illegal streaming and online uploads. For Abulu, the years in between were spent largely at his own expense, and he says no one in the industry has acknowledged it.
