Namibian musicians get $74 000 in royalties

Local musicians received a total of $74 200 in royalties against $9 777 paid to international artists. The development is a “relief” for local artists who in the past complained that they were not getting royalties.

The highest paid local artist received $1 700 and the 2017 royalties’ rate was at $0.080 cents per song. The amount differs every year depending on the behaviour of the market in terms of advertising.

Radio Energy general manager Joseph Ailonga commended NASCAM for doing a good job. He said, however, that the organisation’s system could not be compared to developed countries with advanced industries.

“South Africa with such a huge population has pretty much the same issues, where artists complain about their royalties. The issue in Namibia is about which radio station is paying royalties,” Ailonga told New Era, adding that Namibian laws were not empowering NASCAM to take radio and TV stations that were not paying royalties to task.

“Energy usually does not pay less than $5 800 to more than $15 000 to NASCAM’s coffers on a yearly basis,” Ailonga said.

But Namibia’s One Africa TV has a different approach in supporting the local industry. The station plays 100% local content and all the money paid to NASCAM goes to local artists.

The allocations for 2017 were as follows:

• The total royalties payments to both local and international artists at 60% of the collected royalties is $83 800.
• NASCAM office administration fees at 30% of collection is $42 000.
• NASCAM members’ social and cultural activity funds at 10% of the collections is $14 000.

Meanwhile, NASCAM is encouraging NBC, commercial and private broadcasters as well as community radio stations to continue playing local music to benefit Namibian artists.