In a curious twist of events, a global brand book publishing firm, Melrose, is seeking refuge in legal technicalities to avoid responsibility for a contract it entered into with a budding writer, Mrs Dupe Olaoye-Osinkolu.
In an Originating Summons, filed on her behalf by a Lagos legal firm, Oluyinka Olujimi & Associates, Mrs. Olaoye-Osinkolu had informed an Ota, Ogun State High Court that the company had since 2012 held onto her intellectual work, in flagrant breach of a contract it signed with her.
She told the court that sometime in 2012, the company published an advertorial in a leading national newspaper inviting people with educational children stories to submit them to it for consideration and eventual publication.
Believing in the integrity of the company, especially being an international organization, the Claimant, like many other Nigerians, forwarded her story which the defendant considered good.
Melrose consequently invited her for negotiation and eventual signing of a contract, the terms of which include that she must not make the story available to any other publishing company, while it made financial pledges, including if it failed to publish the work.
Seven years on, the company has neither published the work nor compensated her, despite repeated demands for the return of her intellectual work, thus raising the fear that it may have published the work in another country under a fictitious name and title.
Determined to retrieve her manuscript and believing that the court would help stop foreigners from setting shop in Nigeria with the belief that it is a country where anything goes and they can cheat the citizens with no consequence, Olaoye-Osinkolu is seeking the following reliefs:
1. A declaration that the Defendant’s failure, neglect and/or refusal to either publish or return the manuscript of the Claimant and/or pay compensation to the Claimant is wrongful and constitutes a breach of Agreement between both parties.
2. A sum of N25 million (Twenty Five Million Naira) only as damages against the Defendant for the loss suffered by the Claimant on the account of not publishing/returning/compensating the Claimant as contained in the Agreement.
3. A sum of N20 Million as compensation for the loss of another contract suffered by the Claimant on account of the Agreement binding the Defendant to the Claimant.
4. Interest at the rate of 10% per annum from the date of judgment until judgement is satisfied as provided in the Rules of court.
However, rather than affirm or deny the claim of the journalist, the company has told the court that it lacks jurisdiction to entertain the matter.
In a Preliminary Objection filed on its behalf by a law firm, Enitan Associates, the company is seeking refuge in a legal technicality that the suit was brought as an Originating Summons and not a Writ of Summons.
Originating summons are processes in which courts are asked to interprete statutes or agreements, while writs are for contentious matters.
But, Olaoye-Osinkolu expressed determination to see the matter to a conclusive end, wondering why the company would seek refuge in technicalities rather than either admit or deny her claims of being unjustly denied the enjoyment of her intellectual property.
She said: “We will see how it ends. This is the same company that, on receiving our court summons pleaded for out of court settlement, and renewed pledges to publish the work. They even hurriedly sent me a hurriedly designed purported book cover in which they mis-spelt my name. In contact with some other writers whose works they also fraudulently obtained and refused to publish, we are waiting for Melrose Books and Publishing. Yet their contract binds us from making the works available to other publishers. We are waiting for them in court.”
The matter has been adjourned to April 9, 2019 for further hearing.
