At the time of going to press on Wednesday, Zain Communications had not filed an entry by a creative young man, Patrick Okine, against the telecom company at an Accra High Court in what is considered by many artists and creative people as a test case for copyright in Ghana. Like a David versus Goliath confrontation, young Patrick, writer, musician and creative artist has locked horns with the giant Zain for allegedly stealing his concept idea format and objectives for a television programme. The programme in question is Zain TouchingLives whose first run of 13 episodes was telecast on GTV, TV3 and Metro TV recently to a roaring success. Patrick Okine, the plaintiff states in his suit filed on May 19 2010 that he conceived and developed an original audio visual social programme to be shown on television in Ghana, and titled it Moments of Life. This is a family programme designed to showcase a benefactor and a beneficiary of a largesse, whereby the beneficiary goes to the benefactor for his generosity. The concept is based on the element of surprise. Plaintiff says that after conceiving the idea and developing the concept, the concept was registered at the Copyright Administrators office in Accra on 8th July 2009. This budget was too heavy to be borne without external sponsorship, so Plaintiff packed a sponsorship proposal which included a pilot of the programme on DVD and presented it to Zain, the defendant for the requisite financial support/sponsorship on August 14, 2009. The proposal was received by Ms. Theresa Victoria Sai. Plaintiff went to Defendant at the end of August 2009 to check on the application and was told by Ms. Theresa Victoria Sai, that the application was receiving appropriate attention. Plaintiff states in his suit that at the end of September 2009, he saw an advertisement of the Defendant Company on TV3 and Ghana Television (GTV), broadcasting an impending programme on television to be tiled Zain Touching Lives. In the advert, Zain was requesting viewers to write to them regarding someone who wanted a wish or dream fulfilled to explain the reason for the choice of that person. Plaintiff says he realized that the concept was similar to Moments of Life, so he went back to Zain and demanded the DVD back, but Ms Sai said it might be in their archives at Tema and that Plaintiff should give them more time to look for the DVD. Plaintiff however drew Ms Sai’s attention to the fact that the pre telecast adverts of their programme ZainTouching Lives, from all indications, was based his concept of Moments of Life, the proposal and DVD on which was till in their custody. After watching the initial episodes of ZainTouching Lives, Plaintiff called Ms. Sai on phone and complained about the stolen concept but she was quick to refute the allegation and added that ZainTouching lives idea was their own. Plaintiff demanded the return of the DVD, but to no avail. In his statement of claim, Plaintiff if seeking special damages totaling approximately GH¢1,00,000 and other reliefs. Source: Graphic Showbiz