‘Jerusalema’ ownership dispute court date set for November

CAPE TOWN - The dispute over the ownership of the popular song, Jerusalema, will soon be settled.

A court date has now been set, and the matter will be heard in the Pretoria High Court in November.

The song, released by Master KG in 2020, was a popular hit during the COVID-19 lockdown. 

But Ntimela Chaukee, also known as DJ Charmza, claims he co-created the song in 2019 with Presley Ledwaba, also known as Biblos.

According to him, Master KG released the song under his name without proper rights or clearances.

Master KG and his label are denying the claims.  

Speaking to Dan Corder on the Afternoon Drive on Tuesday, Eitan Stern, the founder of creative legal agency Legale, said that to avoid situations like this, artists should always keep written agreements. 

“You know we want to think that the matter in question is one of IP [Intellectual Property], but this is more a question of contract, and so what we always encourage artists to do is to have a studio royalty distribution sheet and say, ‘cool, we’re going to work on something for the next few hours and maybe something comes out of it, maybe nothing comes out of it, but this is how we’re going to split the royalties.’”  

Stern added that if Master KG is found guilty, he would have to pay up.

“If it is found that Master KG didn't own the copyright or hadn't paid DJ part of the copyright or remember copyright can also be owned in percentages by multiple people. So, if the court finds that part of it owned by someone else, then there would be a recon of how much he’s made from it, and he’s got a publishing company that acquaints to him, so there would be recons in this sense.”