Do journalists own articles published by their employers?

The other day I met Fred Bizimungu, a colleague and friend, and we got into a discussion about the rights of a journalist to their material. The issue we were debating was whether journalists do retain any rights to the material they publish. There are two schools of thought; there are those who think that once you have written, that is it, the rights shift to the publisher. Another school of thought holds that the journalist holds the rights and if the publisher wants to use the story or photo again, then they must pay again or something like that. Edwin Musoni, a practicing journalist believes that when the story is published, according to the international copy right law, the rights shift to publisher. Accordingly, the publisher has a right to reproduce; resell the story or a photo as many times as they wants. “The company pays a journalist every month for collecting and producing stories. So you can’t claim the property again since you sold it,” Musoni argues. However, the question is, what if the publisher decides to sell the material to another media house to be republished, should the journalist be given a certain percentage? Fred Oluoch, another colleague, argues that if the rights are retained by the publisher, then the publisher should get the journalist’s permission to sell or re-use an article. “To me, I would really love to have the rights to my work since it bears my byline, my ideas, the publisher should give some percentage when he decides to let it published by another,” Oluoch points out. As a journalist, the right to use materials is of paramount importance. The organization and the author did not have any problem. Nevertheless, the article rightly credited the author and the organization. Speaking to The Sunday Times, Gaspard Safari the president of the Rwanda Journalists’ Association said that as soon as a journalist is employed by the media house, any article produced belongs to that media house. “I am not sure what the current bill says about that particular issue but from experience, the right to the article belongs to the media house not to the journalist because he is paid to do that,” Safari stressed. The Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Denis Police said that the Intellectual Rights bill currently does not prescribe anything like that in its articles. He also expressed his assumption that when the article is published in the paper, the rights shift to the publisher by default. “The contract between a journalist and an employer should be detailed bearing all those issues. And both parties should abide by the contract. I also happened to work for a research company but the work was for that company,” Polisi reiterated. However, the current media bill is silent on the idea since there is no single article on intellectual rights. I think that the current media bill should come up with specific answers to the issue since some journalists work without clear guidelines or even a contract. It doesn’t make sense how the publisher can keep on republishing and profiting by selling the story or photo to many media houses while the author is not given a single penny apart from the salary. I think there is still much to be debated and the Executive and Legislators should come up with a clear law on this issue. Media practitioners should also not just dwell on searching for news but be well informed on their own law on top of other issues. findmugabe@yahoo.com