If you’ve been on Nigerian music Twitter, you’ve seen people talking about the “private copy levy” and why it matters. Here’s what’s actually happening.
What Is This Levy?
It’s a small fee placed on devices people can use to copy music: phones, laptops, hard drives, flash drives. Since everyone copies music (downloads, WhatsApp shares, etc.) and you can’t police every single copy, the law says: let’s collect a fee and pay it back to the people who make & own that music. This isn’t just for the sake of generosity; it is money that should actually belong to music rights holders.
So What’s the Problem?
The Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC) wants to send all the levy money through one organization: MCSN.
Sounds simple, except:
- Many rights holders never chose MCSN to represent them
- The framework for how the money will be split is secret
- No one knows who qualifies or how much they’ll get
- There’s no clear audit trail
- According to IFPI, paying through an unauthorised body could cause “irreversible harm”
Why RELPI Is Pushing Back
On January 21, 2026, RELPI (headed by Mavin Records CEO Tega Oghenejobo) sent a formal letter to the NCC saying:
Their main points:
- No CMO currently represents sound recording owners (the labels and artists who own masters) in Nigeria
- Sound recordings are legally different from publishing/songwriting rights
- Record companies invested the money to make the music in the first place, therefore, they deserve transparency about where their money goes
- The law (Section 88(9)(d) of Copyright Act 2022) already allows opt-out provisions and multiple distribution channels
- Certain CMOs haven’t built enough trust to handle billions of other people’s money.
What they’re asking for:
- Sound recording funds should go through RELPI, which their members actually chose
- Or at minimum: pause the disbursement and fix the framework first
- Publish who qualifies, how splits work, what deductions are taken, and where audits are, for the sake of transparency.
They gave the NCC 72 hours to respond and copied ministers of Justice, Arts & Culture, Finance, and the Solicitor General. That’s how serious it is.
The Two Types of Music Rights
People often lump “music rights” together, but there are actually two separate categories:
- Musical works = songwriting, composition, publishing
- Sound recordings = the actual masters (what labels and artists own)
These are legally distinct. You can’t pay sound recording owners through an organisation that only represents publishers. That’s like paying your electricity bill to the waste company.
Why Does This Matter?
Record companies are the ones funding Nigerian music:
- Discovering talent
- Paying for studio time
- Marketing and promotion
- International distribution
- Long-term catalogue development
They’re the primary investors in the industry. If levy money, which should be their money, disappears into opaque structures with no accountability, that’s not just unfair. It undermines the entire ecosystem and makes investors nervous about putting money into Nigerian music.
The Real Warning
As entertainment lawyer Fọza put it in her thread on X: “This is exactly how money disappears in Nigeria.”
Not through dramatic corruption, but more quietly, through:
- Unclear frameworks
- Unpublished rules
- Secret deductions
- No audits
- Silence
When billions are involved, and no one knows who’s getting paid or based on what criteria, “a few billions get swept under the carpet.”
What Happens Next?
The levy disbursement is imminent. The questions that need answering:
- Will sound recording owners be recognised in the sharing formula?
- Which body legitimately represents them?
- Will the NCC pause and review, or push ahead?
RELPI says their members “will not be compelled to accept any arrangement that does not protect the legitimate interests of their artists, creators, and investors.”
Bottom Line
This levy could stabilise the Nigerian music industry and create reliable revenue streams. Or it could become another missed opportunity where good policy gets ruined by poor, opaque execution.
The difference? Transparency. And whether the people who actually made the music are allowed to follow their money.
Right now, they can’t. And they’re not happy about it.
