By Mariam Nakalema
In a social media post in April, events promoter and artiste manager Abtex Musinguzi sacked musician Serena Batamuliza aka Serena Bata, saying she breached her contract by performing several times without her permission.
Through his lawyers of Lukwago and Company Advocates, Abtex demanded sh350m as compensation from Serena for breaching the contract.
Abtex went ahead to warn media houses against playing her songs that were released under his management, saying he is the owner.
He listed the songs as Ebisenge, Rukundo, Ofunye Omusoga and Omulala, threatening to sue whoever plays them.
Well, Serena has returned the fire through her lawyer, Deric Fredrick Namakajo.
Speaking in an interview with The Kampala Sun on Thursday, May 18, 2023 in Kabalagala, a city suburb, Namakajo, who also works the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative, complained that Abtex was the first to breach the contract.
“Serena should be the right person to report Abtex. In the contract, Abtex was supposed to be giving her accommodation, but he stopped in February 2022. He has not been paying the rent for the artiste. They agreed on transport, but Abtex took the car away from Serena Bata in January 2022,” Namakajo said.
“l saw Abtex during an interview on a certain television, saying all songs of Serena Bata should not be played again, which was wrong because he was uploading all the songs they did under Abtex Promotions on their YouTube, but in the agreement, the songs were supported to be uploaded on Serena’s accounts. Although Abtex was wrong to summon Serena, we received the documents and we have our defence. We are waiting for what’s next, and we are ready because Abtex did not use the right procedure to get copyright over Serena’s songs.”
