Zakes Bantwini’s battle for ‘Osama’ remix royalties

Grammy award-winning artist Zakhele Madida, popularly known as Zakes Bantwini, is reportedly in a fight to get royalties for his album and the remix of smash hit song Osama. 

Zakes Bantwini won his first Grammy with Nomcebo Zikode and Wouter Kellerman, when their song Bayethe won Best Global Music Performance earlier this month. 

The popular musician and producer has had a successful two years making hit tracks such as iMali and Osama. 

It has been reported, however, that the artist is unhappy with a company that has made a remix of Osama. 

Unpaid royalties

The Sunday World reported that Zakes has taken a company called Paradise Africa Distribution (PAD) to court for breaching their agreement by remixing his blockbuster song Osama without his consent.

In the affidavit filed at the Johannesburg High Court in December 2022, the artist says he’s also owed royalties. 

PAD, an independent label representing multiple artists, slapped Zakes with a R2.4 million lawsuit against his company Mayonie for breach of contract.  

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They accused the musician’s label of signing a marketing and sales deal with the international label Universal Music.

PAD says they already concluded their contract with Zake’s label over ten years ago, before he signed with Universal Music as well.

The publication reported the deal with PAD and Mayonie allowed them to “exploit and distribute the album’s audio and audio visual products overseas”. 

Reportedly, the deal allowed PAD to sell Zakes’ songs globally, however, not in Africa.

“It further allowed service providers and other third parties to digitally exploit the album in all technical formats and products via digital distribution.”

Osama remix

For the exploitation of the album, PAD agreed to pay 50% net of the profit to Mayonie. PAD and Mayonie allegedly signed the deal in October 2016, and the contract is supposed to last 10 years until 2026. 

PAD says when Zakes signed with Universal Music he breached their contract, as he gave away his exploitation rights to Universal Music. PAD said they would have earned approximately R2.4 million. 

According to the publication, Zakes reportedly did admit he signed with Universal Music but denied he breached the contract and that PAD experienced financial losses. 

Last year August, PAD released a remix of the song, Osama by Peter Tong and Paul Roger, a remix they still promote on their website. The song can be streamed on Spotify, Apple Music and iTunes. 

In their agreement, remixes had to be agreed upon by both parties. Zakes also says he has unpaid royalties for his album. 

Update*

The Citizen reached out to Zakes Bantwini’s team and responded by commenting that “the matter is with the high court and he won’t be commenting until a ruling has been made.”

The publication also reached out to PAD for comment and is waiting for a response.

Compiled by Sandisiwe Mbhele