The legal war between Runtown and Eric Many Records continues to intensify with the new report that the label has slammed the singer with a fresh N267 million law suit at the Federal High Court, Abuja.
According to multiple sources, Runtown has a fresh N267 million-heavy law suit to deal with. This is coming after the N65 million court injunction slammed against him by his label, a few months back.
NewTelegraph quoted the label to have said, “the new court Injunction was slammed on Runtown because he is owing the label N267 million and he has not also adhered in line to deliver his album appropriately and he has deliberately tried to register the name Runtown without the label’s consent and abscond from contract.”
The same source reported that Johnson Adumike, the general manager of the label said, “as you are aware, lately we have been in Court with Runtown over copyrights issues with regards to two collabo videos he made without our prior approval. Truly, the much-publicized legal action at the Federal High Court in Lagos was, contrary to what many believe, not on the entire contract we signed with Runtown. It was only on the unapproved collabo videos and we claimed general damages of about N65 Million for the copyright infringement.”
He went on to add that,
“we had thought that Runtown would see reason to retrace his steps on our Contract following the ‘warning case’ on copyright infringement. This was not to be as he took to the social media, especially Twitter, dishing out insults on our Chairman, Prince Okwudili Umenyiora, boasting that he was no longer with Eric many. His elder brother joined on Instagram boasting that his company ‘JSparrowMedia’ is now the person booking Runtown’s shows and no longer Ericmany. Under our Contract, the professional name ‘Runtown’ and other names are licensed to Ericmany. Yet Runtown went to Trademarks Registry in Abuja and has been working to take the names from us’.
‘These and many other issues thrown up by the copyrights suit confirmed to us that indeed Runtown had walked out on us. We therefore decided to sue him for comprehensive breach of contract, to the sum of N266,694,755’.
‘While our Contract is supposed to fall due for expiration on 22nd June 2018, Ericmany now has an outstanding balance of about N266,694,755.08 to recoup on our investment and expenses on Runtown’s career. He is also yet to deliver an Album which the Contract requires him to deliver to us during the Contract period. The Contract spells out the procedure for the production of the Album. Runtown is yet to initiate the procedure, whilst he focuses on Abuja Trademarks Registry scheming on how to make us lose grip of his professional name”.
Runtown and Eric Many directors have maintained a rocky relationship for a long time now. The CEO of the label, Dilly Umenyiora, particularly, has been at the fore front of the singer’s troubled history with the label. It was reported that the trouble stretches back to the singer’s early years with the label when both parties had to argue before agreeing to let the singer own the creative process, against the suggestion of the label.
Towards the end of the initial binding contract, there was a drag before Runtown agreed to extend his stay with the label. And after that phase of trouble, allegations started to fly around about Runtown was not remitting earnings from shows and events to the label, as agreed in the contract. It is the re-occurrence of these issues that led to the long-stretched legal battle between Runtown and Eric Many Records.
