Mawu embroiled in intellectual property wrangle

Malawi Writers Union (Mawu) has been embroiled in an intellectual property wrangle where it stands accused of producing, distributing and selling a book tilted Assignment without the author’s consent.

The author, Ananiya Alick Ponje, has since threatened to sue the union which at the weekend also unveiled the book at the residence of Norway Ambassador, Kikkan Haugen.

Ponje expressed his displeasure on Mawu’s official Facebook page on Saturday.

“Having the books published by Mawu was supposed to be a choice and after I got the first copy which has silly mistakes, either made by the designer or whoever was adding information on sections like the cover, I chose not to engage with the union any further.

“I communicated this to the president on three occasions, but he ignored my view and went ahead to sell the book with the ‘silly’ mistakes. Now, my humble appeal to everyone is not to buy any book bearing my name and being sold by Mawu. I appeal for your patience as I explore relevant avenues of settling the matter,” he wrote.

In an interview, Ponje said he considers suing Mawu as well as reporting the case to the Copyright Society of Malawi (Cosoma).

However, Mawu president Sambalikagwa Mvona challenged Ponje to “report anywhere he wants”.

“The truth of the matter is that we withdrew the book after he expressed dissatisfaction with the editing.

“The book is not on the market and we didn’t even unveil it as reported,” he said.

Mvona admitted that the book has the silly mistakes, saying “in book writing nothing is perfect”.

“We have been reaching out to him to discuss, but he is not willing. The problem is that there are people who are speaking through him to discredit Mawu,” he said.

Ponje, who is also a journalist, was the runners-up in the 2013 Peer Gynt Award which is sponsored by the Royal Norwegian Embassy.

Writer Shadreck Chikoti was the winner for his novel Azotus the Kingdom whereas Jonathan Mbuna was third with Pilgrims Together.

The books were published internationally as part of the prizes.