While every attempt has been made to ensure this transcript or summary is accurate, Special Assignment or its agents cannot be held liable for any claims arising out of inaccuracies caused by human error or electronic fault. This transcript was typed from a transcription recording unit and not from an original script, so due to the possibility of mishearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, errors cannot be ruled out.

 

FENLEY: - Piracy is robbing South Africa’s film and music industry of millions, while local actors and musicians are being crippled financially. This week, take a look at how piracy has affected locally produced movies, like “Tsotsi” and “Mama Jack”. We also see what local musicians and law enforcers are doing to stamp out this crime.

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, “TSOTSI” CO-PRODUCER - Tsotsi was the 15th out of twenty four awards and as it got closer and closer I realized that basking in the glory of being a nominee is about to end and when Will Smith walked on I thought they’ve matched the presenter for the award.

 

UPS: - WILL SMITH – The Oscar goes to Tsotsi accepting the award director Gavin Hood

 

UPS: - VOICER - Tsotsi’s Oscar win was more than just a proud moment for South African film makers and actors – the win has put the local industry firmly on the map. But at the same time, a war is being waged that’s threatening the very existence of South African movie-making. Pirates have exploited Tsotsi and its Oscar win, flooding the local market with counterfeit DVDs. This has cost the producers millions of rand. Every time fake DVDs of home-grown movies like Tsotsi or Mama Jack are bought or sold, the future prosperity of our film industry is jeopardized.

 

PRE-TITLE: BLEEDING ON THE INSIDE

 

UPS: - VOICER - Pirates manufacture and distribute counterfeit copies of movies. All too often they recruit cheap labor to sell their products on South Africa’s streets. We were able to buy bootleg versions of locally produced Tsotsi and Mama Jack for only fifty rand from hawkers outside Balfour Shopping Centre in Johannesburg. The official Tsotsi DVD is only due for release in July. But the pirated version was widely available on the streets even before the film went on circuit. The fake copy dates back to a 2004 edit and has a different ending to the acclaimed final cut. In April two people involved in the post-production of the movie were arrested for producing and distributing pirate copies. 

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - You’ve nearly put three years of your life into making a film and somebody comes along, it is just absolutely the cheapest and nastiest business in the world I mean you simply take a DVD, copy it and sell it as if its your own and you know my initial reaction was its impossible because we haven’t made DVDs yet, I never actually thought that somebody within the system would have the gall to steal it and sell it to other people.

 

UPS: - VOICER - It’s estimated that through piracy the local crew of Tsotsi has collectively lost a minimum of one million rand in royalties. The local industry is in a catch twenty two situation the more popular the movie, the more it’s going to be exploited by pirates.

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - There may be no visible blood but the industry is bleeding. It was sort of welcome to the real world, you know where you become a victim of your own success in a way and I think the thing about piracy is that we’ve known it’s been here all along but we’ve always regarded it as being somebody else’s problem and with the Mama Jack and Tsotsi scenarios we realized that it is very much the South African film industry’s problem

 

UPS: - VOICER - “Mama Jack” was released locally to the delight of audiences late last year. It looked set to become the highest grossing film of all time in South Africa – almost more than Titanic. But again, counterfeits flooded the market and undermined sales that could’ve made box office history.

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, MOVIE MAKER & ACTOR – Mama Jack was very badly affected by piracy. Elton John sings a song it’s a sad sad sad sad situation and really this is sad you know. You’re sitting in Ballito Bay you’re having a lekker holiday, the movie is motoring along fine and all of a sudden Alfie Ntombela phones me and says listen there’s four guys selling mama jack at the corner some corner of the east rand mall and then Anant phones me they caught some guys in Durban and then reports come through from all over the country and then Mama Jack went choo choo choo.

 

UPS:-  ANANT SINGH, FILM PRODUCER - We believe that the piracy has impacted revenue streams by a value of about ten million rand of which we think five million is attributable to the theatrical release and five million to the video and DVD release

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, FILM MAKER AND ACTOR -Unfortunately for me and I can only speak for myself now, there was no reward at the end, nothing, not one cent.

 

UPS: - ANANT SINGH, FILM PRODUCER - The most annoying thing in the case of Mama Jack was the fact that the quality of the pirate version was so good and you know we’ve now established that the source of the piracy was one of the production facilities that we use so you know which is really a travesty it’s a disaster.

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - It’s like having somebody within your family or a cousin or an uncle that steals from you and somehow it makes it worse because these are people who are in a trusted position. These are the people who know the value of what they are doing and dealing with.

 

UPS: - ANANT SINGH, FILM PRODUCER - Of all the cases around the world I think this is the first time certainly for me that I’ve identified the situation where it came out of a sort of inner network

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - Probably our relationship with our post production facility is going to change as an industry. I think it’s going to be very different we’re going to expect all sorts of controls in place. I mean you can imagine people having polygraph tests on a regular basis just to be sure that some aggrieved staff member doesn’t do something like this then resign, so it has put the focus very much on procedures, on security on signing in and signing out on internal cameras and it is fundamentally going to change the way we do business.

 

UPS: - VOICER - More than eighty percent of South Africa’s fake DVDs are sold in Gauteng costing the film industry an estimated eight hundred million rand a year. It’s not unusual for hawkers to openly sell counterfeit DVDs at busy intersections.

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, FILM MAKER AND ACTOR –Ja, I had this experience, I took the Rivonia Offramp, and there was this guy, a very good natured guy, he had mama jack, a pirated version of Mama Jack, Tsotsi and King Kong and he said sir, thirty rand for three DVDs

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - I was driving in Bryanston and as it is in the traffic you’re moving at very slow speeds and this hawker came up to me and showed me this bag with counterfeit Tsotsi DVD’s

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, FILM MAKER AND ACTOR -Jis and I was immediately, I said listen, do you know what the, dinges you’re doing here, no what is wrong, oh you are Mama Jack hey Mama Jack I’ve got your movie look here

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - and of course so many emotions go through your head and the first thing you want to do is jump out your car and take them all away

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, FILM MAKER AND ACTOR - so I’m complaining, I’m complaining, he says hey mama jack why are you not complaining about those people who are selling the coat hangers?

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - you’re incredibly angry because it’s like somebody standing there with your pair of shoes trying to sell them back to you

 

UPS: - HAWKER – We do not sell those South African movies because we are in South Africa and we are foreigners. We cannot mess in a plate where we eat. It is a crime but is better than to shoot someone and take his things and sell for a thousand. On behalf of us we are preventing crime from the hijackers

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - this piracy is a serious threat to the future and the existence of the industry as we know

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, FILM MAKER AND ACTOR - I love making movies, I love watching movies so I don’t really want to do anything else but if I’m forced not to make movies any more I can’t.

 

AD BREAK 1

 

UPS: - VOICER -: Last year over a million fake DVDs, CDs and computer games were confiscated  most of them in Gauteng. It’s the hub of pirating in South Africa and some operators reportedly make up to sixty thousand a week here. We recently visited Gauteng’s piracy hotspot Montana Traders Square in Pretoria. With us was an official from the South African Federation Against Copyright Theft, or SAFACT.

 

UPS: - CORNELIUS POTTER; OPERATIONS MANAGER SAFACT:  - Its a Pakistani driven smuggling operation so normally when you raid a stall, you won’t get hold of the owner of the stall itself, they will normally be in the background, most of the time you won’t know who the person is they’re making use of cheap labour. When you go to the one stall, and for instance you try to raid the one stall within a few minutes, all the other stalls within the flea market area will know about the police or customs or press or whatever that they’re present at the scene and they will just start pulling down the shutters, close the stalls and they will just bomb shell and just disappear.

 

UPS: - RONEL FERNANDES, FLEA MARKET WORKER - I worked here only one weekend but my shop was that one there and I was working there for four or five months and it wasn’t bad, only what was bad is the people that’s coming, take your DVD’s, you must run away because otherwise they catch you, I mean it’s not fine because they want to eat as well, there’s no jobs anywhere, so where can you legally make money, if you don’t buy drugs and sell drugs it must be DVDs, so you must have choice, which one you want to do, drugs or DVDs. we choose DVDs, that’s how we make money.

 

UPS: - VOICER - And who were you working for?

 

UPS: - RONEL FERNANDES, FLEA MARKET WORKER - The owner, you never know the owner never never never

 

UPS: - CORNELIUS POTTER; SAFACT OPERATIONS MANAGER - This place been raided many, many times and there is a scenario where the stalls getting raided and every time when a suspect is being caught he’s prosecuted once that suspect has been prosecuted, the next manager or the next owner or tenant of the stall will just take over because the previous owner will just disappear.

 

UPS: - VOICER - In 2004 just over seven hundered thousand fake movies were seized. Last year one point one million were confiscated. This doesn’t seem to deter pirates out to make big bucks at the expense of actors, film makers and musicians. Counterfeits continue to flood the market and authorities continue to confiscate what they can. SAFACT officials, the police and customs, make sure every DVD or CD they confiscate can never be used or sold again.

 

UPS: - JAMES LENNOX, CEO: SAFACT - Whether we were more effective is very difficult to say, we would like to think we are, but it’s obviously obvious that the market is growing so you know we’re not keeping up, even though we’re increasing seizures, we’re not keeping up with the explosion of pirated product in this country.

 

UPS: - VOICER - Pirates aren’t just robbing film makers, actors and producers. Record companies have reported major losses to the tune of several hundred million rand a year Promoters, producers and record company owners recently took to the fight to the streets of central Johannesburg part of an ongoing anti-piracy campaign, dubbed Operation Dudula. Musicians have also had enough.

 

UPS: -  REBECCA MALOPE, GOSPEL SINGER - Breaking of fake goods on floor, Rebecca says look at this, sixteen rand, says just imagine my new album sixteen rand, break DVD.

 

UPS: - VOICER - Gospel singer, Rebecca Malope is one of the most pirated musicians in South Africa. Her latest album, Mthombo, was bootlegged before it was even officially released.

 

UPS: - REBECCA MALOPE; GOSPEL SINGER - Piracy has affected all of us the whole music industry, I’m twenty one years now in the industry but I can’t buy myself a Porsche car, its so amazing because of this piracy, you know our musicians they die poor because of this piracy, some they don’t even have places to stay because of this piracy, some their children can’t even go to school, they can’t even help a poor child on the street because of this piracy, it must come to an end its affecting the whole industry, musicians and other artists, I’m talking about actors, movies it must come to an end.

 

UPS: - VOICER - Operation Dudula was initiated by Mzwakhe Mbuli and other concerned artists. Mzwakhe is on a public awareness crusade but not just on the streets. He’s also educating the youth about piracy and its devastating effects on the industry.

 

UPS: - MZWAKHE MBULI, MUSICIAN AND PEOPLE’S POET - album or CD but when it comes to Steve Hofmeyer or Johnny Clegg then you buy things that are made at the flea market, Bruma Lake where a CD is just it’s thirty bucks it’s happening, it’s rife, something must come to an end, this thing must be put to an end. Thank you very much.

 

UPS: - MZWAKHE MBULI, MUSICIAN AND PEOPLE’S POET - I was shown pirated copies of myself, although I was in Photostat form, although the quality was not up to scratch you know I was furious, very angry, angry that’s why I was saying u wonder how many copies of this nature have been marketed out there. It’s like cloning you know, you know these things like cloning I lack the proper way but this is sinful this is crime this is wrong it makes you angry.

 

UPS: - VOICER - Record companies say piracy is threatening local music. It’s also destroying businesses. In South Africa bootlegging reduces sales by between twenty five and fifty percent as it reportedly does in only seventeen other countries.

 

UPS: - LESLIE SEDIBE, LEGAL AND BUSINESS AFFAIRS DIR: EMI - And so if you kill the goose that lays the golden egg then there won’t be any more eggs and you know if people are really going to turn around and say south African music is dying, or the standard of music is dying I think people need to have a serious look at themselves I think we need to do a serious introspection as a country and say what have I done for my part to support south African music

 

UPS: - MZWAKHE MBULI, MUSICIAN AND PEOPLE’S POET - The anger is big, it’s like when you talk of a power keg it’s gonna be an explosion, these guys are angry, these guys have been taken for granted they have been undermined and it’s about time look at how Tsotsi movie was undermined, these guys have a nerve, this time we’ll deal with them

 

UPS: - LESLIE SEDIBE, LEGAL AND BUSINESS AFFAIRS DIR: EMI - The more successful the artist, the more, the higher the chances that their music will be pirated so for example your Brenda Fassie, your Rebecca Malope, Mandoza and all the other successful, Ringo Mandoza and Mzwakhe Mbuli’s all your more successful artists, the more success the artist has, the greater the likelihood that their music will be pirated

 

UPS: - REBECCA MALOPE; GOSPEL SINGER - I am saying to them one day whatever you doing it will catch up with you I am just right at your door, I’m just right at the corner, I’ll get in, one day I’ll catch up, I don’t care if I sing Gospel or what but piracy is wrong and if I find somebody doing that if only God help me I dunno what I’ll do. God help me.

 

AD BREAK 2

 

UPS: - VOICER - The Police and SAFACT, the Recording Industry of South Africa recently raided a home-operator in Daspoort, Pretoria. Undercover agents had earlier bought goods to prove the suspect was running a home industry and selling fake DVDs and CDs. Over eight hundred and forty DVD masters were confiscated. It’s alleged the suspect had been using counterfeit masters to produce and sell further copies. Alarmingly the suspect’s wife works for the police but they denied any knowledge of an illegal business being run from their house.

 

UPS: -  JAMES LENNOX; CEO: SAFACT - Obviously as you can see here it’s a fairly cheap industry to set up and with the technology that’s available it’s become easier and easier for home operators and the market is obviously quite large in these working class areas ad you know people are exploiting those opportunities they’re buying the aggravating thing is they actually seem to be buying pirated copies from flea markets and then copying them to sell on and that is just unacceptable right through. With the increase in sort of vigilance by customs and police at the airports we are noticing a drop off in imported pirated copy and obviously that’s creating a bigger market for home operators.

 

UPS: - BRAAM SCHOEMAN, MANAGER: ANTI-PIRACY UNIT, RISA - We also find that home operators see it as a business opportunity but it’s the syndicates that worry us and you know we feel that by the public supporting people selling pirated or counterfeit music, they are supporting these organised crime syndicates.

 

UPS: - VOICER - Piracy is definitely impacting on cinema sales as well. These days at least twenty percent of the box office can be lost if a pirate copy hits the market at the right time.

 

UPS: - FERDI GAZENDAM, CEO: STER KINEKOR GROUP - I think where we would like to see more serious fines is for those kingpins, those people that are big players and when I talk big players you really have people out there that are equivalent to the size of a Ster Kinekor home entertainment and that’s how big their businesses are

 

UPS: -  JAMES LENNOX; CEO: SAFACT - The industry has to go for criminal convictions, not civil settlements, we want criminal convictions, they are breaking the law and we want them sentenced appropriately and that is what we are concentrating on now at SAFACT with the police and prosecuting services.

 

UPS: - PAUL RALEIGH, TSOTSI CO-PRODUCER - if the fines are severe enough and the jail sentences are severe enough people will go either get honest or do something else but people must learn that this is not a way to make money.

 

UPS: - ANANT SINGH, FILM PRODUCER - the public at large is the most sort of important person or the most important component in this mix because on the one hand they wouldn’t think of stealing a bottle of milk in a supermarket but if someone flashes a DVD in front of them at a street corner they would buy it for thirty or forty rand but it’s actually the same it’s you’re stealing something that is an intellectual property rather than you know a bottle of milk

 

UPS: - LESLIE SEDIBE, LEGAL AND BUSINESS AFFAIRS DIR: EMI - I don’t buy stolen goods I don’t and the same if somebody rocked up at your door and said to you here is the new brand new M3 BMW it goes for fifty thousand would you buy it?

 

UPS: -  JAMES LENNOX; CEO: SAFACT - Where’s the cut off, I don’t have the financial means to buy an S Class Mercedes, does that give me the right to buy a stolen one, you know, the selective morality, people as soon as you ask them why they bought this they start giving you excuses

 

UPS: - LEON SCHUSTER, MOVIE MAKER & ACTOR – So just make an example of somebody let him go and sit behind bars and eat vrot pap en vuil water for three years and this thing will stop that the only thing that will stop it I’m sure

 

UPS: - ANANT SINGH, FILM PRODUCER - it’s wrong and it’s the most easy way of stealing and your moral conscience has to be that you’re doing something that’s not supposed to be done.

 

UPS: - LESLIE SEDIBE, LEGAL AND BUSINESS AFFAIRS DIR: EMI - the pirates is that we are investing more and more money we will catch up with you sooner or later you will be behind bars, you will be arrested, now is the time for you to convert come clean, work with the industry, turn to be a legitimate distributor of music the industry wants to work with you, but if you’re going to continue playing games your days are numbered.