Barima Sydney has revealed how bloggers urged him to take legal action against Wendy Shay for using his popular song African Money without his consent.
The veteran hiplife artist clarified that he did not see Shay’s actions as a violation of copyright since there were some differences in the lyrics she used in her song.
During an interview with Amansan Krakye on Property FM, Barima Sydney emphasized that no one owns exclusive rights to language in songs, which is why he decided to let Shay off the hook for her ‘mistake.’
He said “I’ve never commented on this Wendy Shay sampling of Africa Money issue because I don’t see that my sister sampled my song.
“Some bloggers tried to spark some confusion between us but she has done her song and I’m not the inventor of the word Africa or money,” he continued
He added “So if I’ve done Africa money and she has also done Africa money it’s all good and so I didn’t have any problem with it but it was bloggers who said Sidney about to drag Wendy Shay to court but I’ve not said anything.
“The words we used in our songs aren’t created by us and there are no new words to be used so we are all using the same words that have existed for long and so whatever I say today someone might have said it already.
“I didn’t see anything wrong and I thought it was normal but then my only problem was when bloggers started creating stories trying to pitch me against her to make her respond to spark something for them I can’t tell.
“I will never stand anywhere to say that Wendy Shay has sampled my song because of the word Africa I’m not the one who brought it and the word money so if someone put these two words together to create something there’s nothing wrong,” he ended.
Barima Sydney’s track ‘Africa Money’ emerged as a major hit in 2007, resonating not only in Ghana but also in neighbouring countries like Nigeria and Ivory Coast.
The success of the song propelled him to perform in various African nations such as Benin, Cameroon, and Chad.
Notably, political parties across the continent, including Burkina Faso’s Congress for Democracy and Progress, Equatorial Guinea’s Democratic Party, Côte d’Ivoire’s Rally of the Republicans, and most recently, Nigeria’s All Progressives Congress, adopted ‘Africa Money’ as a campaign song.
This trend was initially set by Ghana’s National Democratic Congress, which used the song unofficially during the 2008 Presidential Election.
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