The Nigerian Copyright Commission on Tuesday destroyed pirated books valued at N141.5 million seized from booksellers and suppliers during various enforcement operations.
The NCC Oyo State Coordinator, Mrs Oluropo Oke, supervised the destruction in Ibadan on behalf of NCC Director‑General, Dr John Asein.
He said the pirated books were seized over the past three years from bookshops and markets in Abeokuta, Sango-Otta in Ogun and Ibadan.
“We valued the books before destroying them and found their total value to be N141,550,000.
“During the operations, we discovered that some booksellers could not prove the source of their purchases.
“There are several features that differentiate original books from pirated copies, including the binding, colour, grammage and point of purchase.
“We need to establish whether the books were bought from the original owners or publishers, or acquired on the streets,” he said.
The director-general warned that the Nigerian Copyright Act empowers the commission to punish any citizen caught pirating or illegally dealing in intellectual property.
He said those in possession of the seized books faced penalties ranging from fines and forfeiture to other punishments under the law.
Asein noted that book piracy continued to harm national economic growth and deprived authors and publishers of the benefits of their work.
(Punch)
