As part of the 3 day Vis-à-vis Music Festival recently organized by the embassy of Spain in Nigeria, the Nigeria Copyright Commission (NCC) in collaboration with the Performing Musicians Employers Association Of Nigeria (PMAN) and Musical Copyright Society Of Nigeria (MCSN) held a music roundtable for the music sector with the theme – MAXIMISING THE INTERNATIONAL DIMENSION OF MUSIC AS A VEHICLE OF CULTURE.
The roundtable event was hosted at THE NIGERIAN MUSIC HOUSE – PMAN’s corporate Headquarters In Lagos On Friday 24 March 2023.
The roundtable moderated by the Arts editor of the Nations Newspaper Mr. Ozolua Uhakheme had a lead discussion by 7 speakers who sought to explore the issues and pathways to optimize the benefit of the Nigerian music economy. It also shared experiences and exchanged ways Nigeria with its rich cultural heritage and huge trove of creative talents especially in the area of music can from the beats it produces derived from our culture and currently reverberating and accepted globally can benefit from same compared with its counterparts abroad. The lead speakers at the roundtable included Mr. Pretty Okafor – President PMAN, Mr. Mayo Ayilaran – CEO MCSN, MPAN Representative, Mr. Vincente Sanchis – Director SGAE, Mr. Julio Gomez – Sin Sal Festival Representative – Mr. Julio Gomez, NTDA representative and the NCC representative – Mr. Michael Akpan
Stakeholders at the programme also advocated for collaboration between the Nigerian and Spanish music industries, which, they opined, would further collaborate and combine the rich cultural heritage of both countries.
Speaking at the event, noted that “only registered members of PMAN will benefit from the collaboration, because all musicians are supposed to register with PMAN, which is the only trade union approved by the Federal Government to oversee the affairs of music in Nigeria.”
On his part, Sell said, “When you put Nigeria and music in the same sentence, everything makes sense. It means something great. So, we are here with a programme, which we had been running through our public diplomacy institution— Casa Africa. We have also been doing this for years in different African countries, with the aim to help international artistes.
“Nigeria and Spain share two things, which are creativity and diversity, and that brings a lot of opportunities for us to work together. Our message is very clear. We are ready to support any initiative.”
