Journalist Kalyegira threatens to sue New Vision for copyright infringement

By our reporter

Timothy Kalyegira, a veteran journalist also owner of Kampala Express, an online paper has threatened to drag Vision Group to court over copyright infringement.

Posting on his Facebook page, Kalyegira accused Vision Group of making it a tendency to steal his photos from Kampala Express page thus threatening to seek legal redress from Uganda’s largest media entity for the habitual infringement of his intellectual property.

He wrote on his Facebook page;

Vision Group continues to steal Kampala Express photos

— The Vision Group, Uganda’s largest media entity, has made a habit of stealing (i.e., using without permission) photos from the Kampala Express, the online paper that I publish on Facebook.

Last year, September 2017, the Kampala Sun, a tabloid owned by the Vision Group, used one of the Kampala Express pictures of NTV’s Josephine Karungi without my permission. I mentioned it here but there was no apology from the Vision Group.

Now in their latest edition of the Kampala Sun, March 2018, they have once again illegally used a Kampala Express picture, this time a photo I took last Saturday of Pastor Martin Ssempa and his family at the Makerere University swimming pool.

I’m now making it officially known that I am going to seek legal re-dress from the Vision Group for this habitual infringement of my intellectual property and that of the Kampala Express.

Quite apart from the illegality of it, is the embarrassing fact that the country’s largest media group, now 32 years old founded in 1986 as the New Vision, can’t find the courtesy and professionalism to request permission for use photos or pay for them.