He said cartels have infiltrated the industry.
“As you may be aware, the Kenyan music industrial employs directly about 20,000 Kenyans and more than one million indirectly. However, it is sad to note that musicians barely benefit from their skills,” Raila said in a statement to the industry in regards to royalties.
In 2016 he intervened in a dispute between musicians and Safaricom over the payment of their Skiza royalties. The musicians got paid, with the highest taking home Sh24 million.
Artistes will meet at 11am tomorrow at the Kenya National Theatre to start the dialogue towards growing a better music industry.
"Today Kenyan music and music made in Kenya is in use all over Africa and the world. But there's a gap. Some key challenges are making it difficult for the musicians to make the most of this opportunities. Sometimes we are famous but not able to pay rent," Virani said.
The proposed agenda for the dicussion is as follows:
1. Fast-track the Copyright Amendment Bill 2017 into law.
2. The President to direct Communication Authority to enforce copyright in broadcasting and increase the local airplay quota of music content to 60% against foreign/international content.
3. Increase KECOBO budget to enable the agency to deal with piracy which is hurting musicians
4. The President to direct Police to work with KECOBO to stop illegal collection of royalties by entities that are not licensed by KECOBO.