AfricaPress-Tanzania: IT should not end up as a mere ceremony, the transfer of the Copyright Society of Tanzania (COSOTA) from the Ministry of Industry and Trade to the Ministry of Information, Culture, Arts and Sports is a wake up call to practitioners of arts and sports.
Loud and clear, the artistes now must produce quality works that will appeal both home and foreign markets as it was insisted by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Information, Arts and Sports, Hassan Abbasi during the handover ceremony in Dar es Salaam on Wednesday.
At the time of the handover, Tanzanian artistes such as Diamond Platinumz, Harmonize, Nandy and Ali Kiba are already world class figures whose some works attract over 50 million viewers worldwide.
Still we don’t know if the artistes are paid properly from what they produce, but the presence of COSOTA in the ministry that deals effectively with sports and arts, convince us to believe things will be better after the transfer.
Welcoming the whole set up as trailblazer of success to the sector, we again laud the Ministry for reducing film permit fee from 500,000/- to 50,000/- a move we hope will motivate artists to produce quality works at affordable cost.
Besides our call to the artistes, we are obliged to laud President John Magufuli who did a commendable job in facilitating the transfer and his tireless efforts that now make arts one of the sectors that contribute much to the economy.
The ministry dealing with arts and sports also deserves compliments for its commitment to improve the artistic environment by looking at their challenges and seek solutions as artists have an important role in our society.
Arts as an essential ingredient of human life so artists should make sure they are paid properly and COSOTA should play well its part.
Since their savior is now well installed at the right position, we would like to urge artists to register their works at COSOTA and will be protected.
We end up telling artistes to unite through COSOTA, cooperate with it and the ministry so that music, films and other forms of arts develop to the desired level.
