SAMRO Consolidates its International Good Standing in Music Rights Management

4 June 2007

Brussels - The Southern African Music Rights Organisation (SAMRO) Limited’s positioning as a truly global role player in music rights management was given a further boost on Friday (1 June 2007) when the organisation was re-elected as part of the 20-person strong Board of Directors of the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC) at CISAC's triennial General Assembly held in Brussels, Belgium.
 
SAMRO's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Nick Motsatse was also elected one of the two vice-chairpersons of the Board of Directors, a first for an African to hold such a position in this global organisation. Added to that was the re-election of SAMRO's Deputy Chief Executive, Alan Johnston, to the Supervisory Board of CISAC's data sharing platform, CIS-Net. Advocate Joel Baloyi was elected to the 20-member Legal Committee of CISAC. All of these come in the wake of the re-election of Johnston to the Chairmanship of the Distribution Technical Committee in March.
 
"We are delighted to see SAMRO represented in such a strong manner in almost all the strategic and crucial committees of CISAC,” commented Prof. Mzilikazi Khumalo, who was one of South Africa's delegates attending the General Assembly in Brussels. "This shows that the good work that SAMRO does on behalf of composers and music publishers is not only acknowledged by us here in South Africa but the entire world is taking note."

The meeting that was attended by over eighty voting members of CISAC, including SAMRO and the South African Recording Rights Association Limited (SARRAL). Also elected was Brett Cottle, the Chief Executive of the Australian society alliance, APRA-AMCOS, as its chairman for a three-year term.
 
"It was a great feeling to see our own society featuring so prominently on the world stage," said Sipho "Hotstix" Mabuse, another prominent South African musician and delegate at the General Assembly. "We often do not fully appreciate the role that organisations such as SAMRO fulfill on our behalf. To me this meeting, including the Copyright Summit, which preceded it, were eye openers," concluded Mabuse.
 
About SAMRO
 
SAMRO is the largest society of composers and authors of music including their publishers on the African continent. Through a system of reciprocal agreements, it represents over 1.4 million composers and lyricists throughout the world. SAMRO' core function is to license the usage of musical works or songs for purposes of broadcasting, performances in public (whether live or  through recorded medium), transmission through a diffusion service, as well as for purposes of mechanical reproduction of the musical works.
 
Apart from its core function, SAMRO is involved in a number of activities ranging from offering a "social welfare" package to its members, giving bursaries to students at various levels of music and related studies, supporting industry initiatives such as Moshito Music Conference and Exhibition, as well as being actively involved in the development of other societies throughout the African continent.
 
About Cisac (Source: Cisac official website)
 
CISAC, the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers, works towards increased recognition and protection of creators' rights.

It was founded in 1926 and is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation. Its headquarters are in Paris, with regional offices in Budapest, Buenos Aires and Singapore.

CISAC numbers (June ’06) 217 authors' societies from 114 countries and indirectly represents more than 2.5 million creators within all the artistic repertoires: music, drama, literature, audio-visual works, graphic and visual arts.

The total amount of royalties collected by CISAC's member societies, on their own national collection territories, amounted in 2004 to more than €6,5 billion..

CISAC's activities are aimed at both improving the position of authors and composers as well as enhancing the quality of the collective administration of their rights around the world. 
 
Today, faced with the increasingly easy and rapid circulation of creative works, CISAC has expanded its activities to meet the new challenges of the digital age. From historical archives on intellectual property, to current data on the business of collective administration; from the management of international standards, to the creation of a worldwide network linking member societies—CISAC is, more than ever, a provider of services for its members.