General

Intellectual Property Rights, a crucial legal framework, serve as a shield for intellectual property and intangible creations of the human mind. These include inventions, literary and artistic works, designs, and symbols used in commerce. Intellectual property rights play a pivotal role in fostering innovation and economic growth by significantly enhancing the incentive to create, invest in research & development, or build a strong brand. TYPES OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS Copyright and Related Rights: This protects original works of authorship, such as literary works (books, poems), artistic works (paintings, sculptures), musical compositions, films, and computer software. It grants the creator exclusive rights like reproduction, distribution, display, and derivative works (adaptations) for a specific period.  Related rights include the rights of performers, producers of sound recordings, and broadcasters. Industrial Property:  This protects creations used in industry and commerce. It encompasses patents, trademarks, industrial designs, and trade secrets. Patents: Grant exclusive rights to inventors for their inventions, which can be new machines, processes, compositions of matter, or improvements on existing inventions. Patents provide inventors with a time-limited monopoly on their creation, allowing them to recoup their investment in research and development. Trademarks: Protect words, phrases, symbols, designs, or sounds used to identify and distinguish the source of goods and services of one party from those of others. Trademarks help consumers know who makes a particular product and ensure they get what they expect. Industrial Designs: Protect the ornamental design of an article, such as the shape or configuration of a product. Trade Secrets: Protect confidential business information that gives a company a competitive advantage. This can include formulas, designs, processes, customer lists, or any information that is not generally known and offers a commercial advantage. Unlike patents, trade secrets can be protected indefinitely as long as they are kept confidential. IMPORTANCE OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS Over the decades, Ghana has made strides to improve the nation’s intellectual property framework.  PROTECTION AGAINST UNFAIR COMPETITION ACT, 2000 (ACT 589) An act to provide protection against unfair competition and related matters was assented on 19th December 2000 to be enacted by Parliament. It aims to create a fair playing field for businesses by prohibiting practices that mislead or damage competitors.  Protection The Act focuses on preventing various forms of unfair competition, including: Who Can Take Action? Any person who is damaged or likely to be damaged by an unfair competition can bring legal action under the Act. Available Remedies The Act empowers courts to grant various remedies, including: Read the entire Act here. INDUSTRIAL DESIGNS ACT, 2003 (ACT 660)  Objective The Act protects the visual design of an article, not its technical function. It grants a registered owner exclusive rights to control the making, importing, selling, or renting of articles incorporating the registered design. Registrable Designs The Act defines what can be registered as an industrial design. Designs must be new and original, not dictated solely by the article’s function. Registration Process The Act outlines the process for applying to register an industrial design with the Registrar of the Industrial Designs Office. Rights of a Registered Owner: A registered owner has exclusive rights to control the use of the design for a specific period, renewable for additional terms. Infringement and Remedies The Act defines what constitutes an infringement of a registered design and provides remedies for rights holders in case of violation. International Treaties The Act acknowledges Ghana’s obligations under international treaties regarding industrial property rights, namely, The Harare Protocol on Patents and Industrial Designs (1982), the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, The Hague Agreement Concerning the International Deposit of Industrial Designs, Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), etc. Read the entire Act here. GEOGRAPHICAL INDICATIONS ACT, 2003 (ACT 659)  Protection Registration Right to Use Only producers who operate within the designated geographical area can use the registered GI for the specified products, provided their products meet the defined quality standards. Enforcement Read the entire Act here. PATENTS ACT, 2003 (ACT 657)  This act is the main legislation governing the issuance and protection of patents in the country. Protection The Act grants patents for inventions that are: Registration Rights of a Patent Holder Provisions The Act provides mechanisms for: Read the entire Act here, TRADEMARKS ACT, 2004 (ACT 664)  This act is the legal framework for registering and protecting trademarks in Ghana. Protection Registration Rights of a Trademark Owner Provisions The act provides provisions for: 2014 Amendment The Trademarks Act was amended in 2014 by the Trademarks (Amendment) Act, 2014 (Act 876). This amendment introduced changes such as: Read the entire Act here. LAYOUT-DESIGNS (TOPOGRAPHIES) OF INTEGRATED CIRCUITS ACT, 2004 (ACT 667) This Act protects the intellectual property rights associated with integrated circuits (ICs) design and layout. Protection Registration Process Rights of the Creator Administrative Bodies of Ghana’s Intellectual Property Rights The Ministry of Justice and the Attorney General’s Department administer intellectual property rights in Ghana. Read the entire Act here. COPYRIGHTS ACT, 2005 (ACT 690)  This Act is the primary legislation governing copyright protection in Ghana. Protection The Act protects original literary, artistic, and scientific works. This includes a wide range of creative expressions such as: Copyright Ownership Rights of Copyright Owner The Act grants copyright holders a bundle of exclusive rights, including the right to: Duration of Copyright: The duration of copyright protection varies depending on the type of work. In general, it lasts for the author’s life plus 70 years after their death. The protection period is calculated differently for certain works, such as films and sound recordings. Fair Use and Exceptions Registration Although registration of a copyright is not mandatory in Ghana, it provides certain advantages, such as facilitating enforcement actions in case of infringement. Enforcement The Act outlines remedies against copyright infringement, including: Read the entire Act here. GHANA’S NATIONAL INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY POLICY AND STRATEGY (NIPPS)  NIPPS was launched on January 21, 2016. The policy aims to: Challenges of NIPPS International Considerations Intellectual property rights are recognised internationally through treaties and conventions like the Agreement on

I explained the Policy Rate and why you should care about this figure on the Monday & Thursday segment of “Entrepreneur In You”, at 8:00 PM on Joy Evening News and DStv Channel 421, and also on Joy 99.7FM on the Joy Business Report. It was a brief explanation.  Whether you’re saving money to start a new business, running an existing business, or just living your life, this rate affects how much things cost. It influences how easy it is to spend or save money and impacts how the economy welcomes our entrepreneurial endeavours. You can watch the brief explanation here: bit.ly/PolicyRate. To dive deeper, I wrote a lengthy piece that extends our understanding of what affects the Policy Rate and what the Policy Rate affects. But then, I looked at the figures. I examined the current numbers. I considered the picture that I paint when I use our prevailing statistics and realised this informative article might be misconstrued as a journalistic ‘hit-piece’. We’re at a charged and crucial time in Ghana’s history, politically and economically. Many factors feed into the present state of affairs, and the last thing I want is to get caught in the crossfire. Yet, what must be said, must be said. Mrs. Margaret Thatcher, the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, once gave a speech on Friday, October 14th, 1983, at Winter Gardens, Blackpool. Excerpts of this speech convey what must be said, and I hope, through the words of the legendary Prime Minister, with the omission of parts of the speech that do not have a direct link to the purpose of this article. The excerpts are in chronological order.  Mrs. Margaret Thatcher, the former Prime Minister, once said: …One of the great debates of our time is about how much of your money should be spent by the State and how much you should keep to spend on your family. Let us never forget this fundamental truth: the State has no source of money other than money which people earn themselves. If the State wishes to spend more it can do so only by borrowing your savings or by taxing you more [or by borrowing against current or future tax revenue that you will pay]. And it is no good thinking that someone else will pay – that “someone else” is you. There is no such thing as public money; there is only taxpayers’ money. Prosperity won’t come by inventing more and more lavish public expenditure programmes. You do not grow richer by ordering another cheque-book from the Bank. And no nation ever grew more prosperous by taxing its citizens beyond their capacity to pay. We have a duty to make sure that every penny piece we raise in taxation is spent wisely and well… … Protecting the taxpayer’s purse, protecting the public services – these are our two great tasks, and their demands have to be reconciled. How very pleasant it would be, how very popular to say, “spend more on this, expand more on that.” And of course we all have our favourite causes – I know I do. But someone has to add up the figures. Every business has to do it, every housewife has to do it, every Government should do it… … But throughout history clever men, some of them economists, not all of them rascals, but few of them vicious men, have tried to show that the principles of prudent finance do not really apply to this Government, this budget, that institution. Not so! They always do, and every sensible person knows it, no one better than you, who had to deal with countries which flouted those principles and are now up to their eyes in debt. Who do they turn to? Those who follow prudent principles like us. When you have only so much money to spend, you have to make choices, and the same is true of Governments. It’s sometimes suggested that Governments can opt out of these choices. They cannot… … let me tell you how you really terminate the health service. You do it by pretending there are no hard choices. You do it by behaving as though Britain has a bottomless purse. You do it be promising what you cannot deliver, by assuming that all you need to do is to snap your fingers, cry “abracadabra” and lo and behold, the sky’s the limit. But the sky is not the limit, for this or for any other Government, or indeed for any other country, and to imply that it is or ever can be is sheer humbug and a fraud on the people… … In facing up to this problem of controlling public expenditure we in Britain are far from alone. Let me give you one or two examples of what is happening in other countries… … I do not say that these measures are the ones we should follow but I do say that no Government, whatever its political complexion, can suspend the laws of arithmetic or run away from reality. There is something else we share with other nations. The World recession has brought high unemployment to almost every country. And in such times, people understandably ask, “where will the new industries and the new jobs come from?” Because there is always a temptation to believe that the dynamism of the past is finally exhausted, and that the best we can hope for is to share out the work we have already got. Nothing could be more mistaken. That is not how our fathers and grandfathers transformed the standard of living in the western world. They did not wait for the boost or scan the horizon for the upturn. They were the upturn and they provided the boost themselves. If Britain had stayed as it was in 1900, millions of people in this country would still be working in agriculture and domestic service, and their standards of living would still be at 1900 levels. If people had known

Ghana was the first country to gain independence in Sub-Saharan Africa on 6th March 1957. Ghana’s path to freedom was fuelled by growing nationalistic sentiment, spearheaded by figures like Kwame Nkrumah, decades of resistance, and calls for self-government, coupled with gradual increases in autonomy through constitutional development. These ultimately led to Ghana breaking free from colonial rule and inspiring other African countries to follow suit. PRELUDE TO INDEPENDENCE Historical Context and Colonial Legacy Control of the British over Gold Coast was legitimised and spread with the bond of 1844, initially signed by most Fante Chiefs to cede jurisdiction of their states over to the British under the impression of protection by the British [16][8]. The British implemented tax collection and other laws as their influence spread to coastal areas in the 1850s until the second of four Anglo-Ashanti wars, from 1863 to 1864, between the then-sovereign Ashanti Empire and the British colony [13]. After the British displaced the Dutch from the Gold Coast, the Ashanti Empire lost allies and was increasingly weakened until a British military invasion that led to the deposition of Prempeh I, the Asantehene of the Ashanti Empire, rendering British colonial rule absolute, despite the Yaa Asantewaa war following the exile of the Asantehene [29]. After that, socioeconomic development in the Gold Coast skyrocketed as the youth received formal education and poverty rates decreased from the export of timber and gold and newly introduced crops, such as coffee and cocoa. Additionally, infrastructural development such as water supply, drainage, hydroelectric projects, public buildings, schools, hospitals, prisons, and communication lines, among others, was undertaken under the then-governor, Gordon Guggisberg. Introducing elementary and secondary schools promoted primary and higher education among the youth. However, this initiative was preferentially executed, leading to the formation of the ‘Ghanaian elite’ made of Chiefs, sons or relatives of Chiefs, or upwardly mobile men in the African communal societies who were privy to the decision-making process of the colony. This led to the creation of classes within the people of the Gold Coast: rural working class, urban working class, and, at the top, the national bourgeoisie. Though the bourgeoisie exploited the working class, they ushered in the concept of nationalism as a maladaptive response of the majority to the xenocentric education they received and the centralised governance of colonial rule [14][19]. Youth Mobilization and Ideological Formation Nationalist ideas fostered by the capitalist bourgeoisie catalysed the formation of the Gold Coast Aborigines’ Rights Protection Society (ARPS) in 1897. ARPS emerged in Cape Coast, Ghana, a crucial centre for intellectual and political resistance during colonial rule. The trigger for its formation came in response to the proposed Lands Bill, which threatened to empower the colonial government to seize “waste” or public lands. This move, seen as detrimental to African land ownership, roused the Ghanaian elite and urban youth, leading to the establishment of ARPS. The ARPS actively protested the Lands Bill, even sending a delegation to London to directly address Joseph Chamberlain, the British Secretary of State. This delegation, marked by inclusivity, disclosed a broader unification against the bill. Their efforts proved successful, as Chamberlain pledged support for dismissing the Lands Bill and preserving “native law” regarding land ownership. Though the influence of the ARPS declined, it formed the seminal resistance that eventually led to the fight for independence [18]. The Role of the Youth in Nationalist Movements In the 1930s, I.T.A. Wallace-Johnson rose to prominence in British West Africa. A passionate organiser and Pan-Africanist from Sierra Leone, Wallace-Johnson saw the injustices of colonial rule and dedicated himself to challenging the status quo. He advocated for a radical approach, introducing Marxist ideas and strategies aimed at mobilising the masses for political change. One of Wallace-Johnson’s most significant contributions was founding the West African Youth League (WAYL) in 1935. This organisation rapidly gained a large and committed following by focusing on securing greater liberties and opportunities for the people of the Gold Coast (modern-day Ghana) and other West African colonies. The WAYL distinguished itself by embracing inclusivity and challenging societal divisions. It advocated for equality, workers’ rights, and unity across tribal lines, fostering a sense of shared struggle among the populace. The WAYL’s methods were as bold as its message. They organised mass rallies, published newspapers to spread their ideas widely, and actively championed the cause of trade unions, empowering workers to fight for their rights. This approach stood in stark contrast to the traditional elite-centred political movements prevalent at the time. The colonial authorities noticed the WAYL’s success. Alarmed by the organisation’s growing popularity and its leader’s radical ideas, they sought to put an end to any potential uprising. Wallace-Johnson faced various forms of suppression, including imprisonment, aimed at hindering his activities and silencing his voice. Despite its challenges, the WAYL played a crucial role in West Africa’s history with its short but impactful existence, championed by youthful and consistent insistence to be heard and treated fairly. It demonstrated the power of mass mobilisation and its effectiveness in demanding greater self-determination for African colonies. The legacy of Wallace-Johnson, as a pioneering figure in the anti-colonial struggle, continues to inspire those fighting for social justice and equality [24]. Additionally, young people entered politics through the “Verandah Boys” movement, which emerged from the post-World War II mass nationalist movement. These were made up of alienated and disaffected young men and women, some working, others jobless, who, in the years leading up to independence, assisted Kwame Nkrumah and others in transforming elite nationalism into mass-based politics. They served as the foot soldiers whose activism in a variety of fields provided the catalyst for a quicker march towards independence. This victorious historical narrative, however, ultimately turns into a tale of failure as youth ascent to prominence in nationalist politics throughout Africa was quickly curtailed by their repression or entrapment in postcolonial state-building initiatives that aimed to downplay generational, class, and gender disparities and demands in the service of national unity [29]. THE INDEPENDENCE ERA The Declaration of Independence: Youth at the