Deal sheet
- Status
- ANGOLA'S COPYRIGHT REGULATOR RULED FOR SADIA IN 2021. NO SOURCE CHECKED SHOWS UNITEL EVER PAID, AND THE SAME REGULATOR LATER CANCELLED SADIA'S OWN LICENCE. SADIA (Sociedade Angolana de Direitos de Autor), Angola's original music copyright collecting society, notified Unitel, Angola's largest mobile operator, in June 2020 that it was owed royalties for musical works used in two Unitel services, the ringback-tone product "Toque de Espera" and the music app "Kisom." By July 2021, Angolan business newspaper Expansão reported the unpaid sum had reached 453 million kwanza. Expansão reported that SENADIAC, the Serviço Nacional de Direitos de Autor e Conexos, the Ministry of Culture body that regulates Angola's collecting societies, had ruled in SADIA's favour, finding that none of the parties Unitel named as the artists' representatives (LS Republicano, Go Edições, Sygnius, Arca Velha, Bom Som and Grupo Chialo) were certified collective-management entities, and recommending that Unitel pay through SADIA as the entity to which the relevant rights had been entrusted.
Unitel did not accept the ruling. In a statement reported by Expansão, Unitel said it already paid representatives of the artists directly and would pay SADIA only if SADIA proved the specific artists were registered exclusively with it and had not already been compensated through another route. SADIA told Expansão it had supplied the proof Unitel asked for, without result, and separately took the dispute to Apple, which hosts the Kisom app; Expansão reported in December 2021 that Apple asked Unitel for proof of royalty payment, that Unitel supplied a contract with one named representative, LS Republicano, and that Apple did not accept it as sufficient.
No source checked for this record shows a court judgment, a confirmed payment, or any other final resolution of the 453 million kwanza claim. This desk searched specifically for a 2022 to 2026 update and found none: the trail in Angolan press stops with the Apple intervention reported in December 2021.
THE SAME REGULATOR THAT RULED FOR SADIA LATER CANCELLED SADIA'S OWN AUTHORISATION. On 8 August 2024, Angolan newspaper O País reported that SENADIAC, at a press conference the day before, cancelled the collective-management authorisation it had granted SADIA in September 2019, on the stated ground that SADIA had not performed its functions as a collecting society for almost two years. Two other Angolan collecting societies, UNAC-SA and AUDAC, were separately suspended for 180 days in the same action, over what SENADIAC described as serious irregularities in how all three organisations collected and distributed royalties and a failure to file the periodic collection and distribution reports Angolan law requires. AUDAC's director-general publicly disputed SENADIAC's authority to act without a ministerial order and said AUDAC would go to court if Angola's Minister of Culture did not respond to an appeal within five days; this desk found no report of how that appeal concluded, for AUDAC or for SADIA.
WHAT THIS RECORD DOES NOT ESTABLISH. Whether any part of the disputed 453 million kwanza was ever paid, to SADIA or to anyone else; whether SADIA's "almost two years" of non-performance cited in the 2024 cancellation overlaps with, or is connected to, the Unitel dispute; and what happened to SADIA's pending claim against Unitel once SADIA's own licence to collect was cancelled. No document found by this desk answers any of these three questions, and this record does not guess at the answers.
CORRECTION, 2 November 2026: This record's headline and search description originally stated that Angola's regulator "ruled Unitel owes SADIA 453 million kwanza." That overstated SENADIAC's 2021 pronouncement, which the source (Expansao, 1 August 2021) describes as finding that none of the parties Unitel named as representatives were certified collective-management entities and recommending Unitel pay through SADIA; it ruled on who is entitled to collect, not on a specific adjudicated debt figure. The 453 million kwanza figure is SADIA's own calculated demand, which Expansao reported the ruling "reinforced," not a sum SENADIAC itself quantified or found owed. The headline, SEO title and meta description have been corrected to say the regulator ruled FOR SADIA in the dispute, not that it ruled a specific amount owed. The amount field of this record already described the sum correctly as a disputed, unpaid claim; only the headline-level framing has changed.
- Type
- Settlement
- Parties
- Sociedade Angolana de Direitos de Autor, Unitel (Angola), Serviço Nacional de Direitos de Autor e Conexos (SENADIAC)
- Amount
- AOA 453,000,000 kwanza (AOA), per Angolan collecting society SADIA's own demand to Unitel, reported by Expansão and attributed to SENADIAC's ruling in SADIA's favour. This is a disputed royalty claim, not a completed payment: no source checked for this record confirms Unitel ever paid any part of it, and Unitel's own public position, also reported by Expansão, is that it owes SADIA nothing absent proof SADIA exclusively represents the artists in question.
- Rights covered
- COLLECTION MANDATE FOR MUSICAL-WORKS ROYALTIES ONLY. SADIA's claim against Unitel concerns royalties for musical works used in two Unitel value-added services, Toque de Espera (a ringback-tone product) and Kisom (a music app), dating from a notification SADIA sent Unitel in June 2020. This is a dispute over who is entitled to collect and be paid a royalty, not a transfer, sale, licence or assignment of any master recording, composition or publishing right. No composition or master changes ownership under this record.
- Territory
- Angola
- Announced
- 2021-08-01
- Primary document
- Trade press
- Sources
- Expansão (Angola), 'SADIA exige 453 milhões Kz à UNITEL ou o caso vai seguir para tribunal,' by Mirene da Cruz, published online 1 August 2021, 19:10, also printed in Expansão edition 635 of 30 July 2021. Fetched and read in full at expansao.co.ao. · O País, "UNAC-SA, SADIA e AUDAC suspensas por má gestão na distribuição de receitas de direitos autorais," 9 August 2024. Fetched and read in full. Reports SENADIAC's director-general Barros Licença cancelling SADIA's September 2019 authorisation and suspending UNAC-SA and AUDAC for 180 days, citing irregularities in royalty collection/distribution and failure to file required reports under Decree-Law No. 114/16 of 30 May. Quotes AUDAC director-general Lucioval Gama disputing SENADIAC's authority to act without ministerial order. · pti.ao, "SADIA vs UNITEL: Apple exige à UNITEL provas de pagamento de direitos autorais," 20 December 2021. Fetched and read in full. Reports Apple requesting proof of royalty payment from Unitel over the Kisom app, Unitel's submission of a contract with LS Republicano, and Apple's rejection of that document as insufficient proof. · Expansão, "SADIA culpa Unitel e DSTv por falhar meta de receita de 200 milhões Kz em 2020." Read for background on the dispute's origin; not the source of the 453 million kwanza figure. · Telecompaper, English-language trade press corroboration of the 453 million kwanza figure and the SENADIAC ruling, citing Expansão. Fetched and read in full; corroborating secondary source, not this record's primary citation.
Read this before citing: ESTABLISHED FROM PRIMARY SOURCES THIS DESK FETCHED AND READ IN FULL: Expansão (Angola), "SADIA exige 453 milhões Kz à UNITEL ou o caso vai seguir para tribunal," published online 1 August 2021 (print edition 635, 30 July 2021), by Mirene da Cruz, naming the 453 million kwanza figure, the June 2020 notification date, SENADIAC's ruling for SADIA, and the six representatives Unitel named; O País, "UNAC-SA, SADIA e AUDAC suspensas por má gestão na distribuição de receitas de direitos autorais," 9 August 2024, reporting SENADIAC's cancellation of SADIA's authorisation and the 180-day suspensions of UNAC-SA and AUDAC; and pti.ao, "SADIA vs UNITEL: Apple exige à UNITEL provas de pagamento de direitos autorais," 20 December 2021, reporting Apple's request to Unitel for proof of royalty payment on the Kisom app.
TRANSLATION NOTE. All three primary sources are in Portuguese. This desk had them translated and cross-checked the translated facts (amounts, dates, named parties, quoted positions) against the original Portuguese text rather than relying on a single machine summary.
NOT ESTABLISHED, AND NOT GUESSED AT IN THIS RECORD: (1) whether Unitel ever paid any part of the 453 million kwanza, to SADIA or to any other representative; (2) the exact date of SENADIAC's underlying ruling on the Unitel claim, as distinct from Expansão's 30 July to 1 August 2021 report of it; (3) whether SADIA's "almost two years" of non-performance cited in its 2024 licence cancellation overlaps with the Unitel dispute period; (4) what became of SADIA's claim against Unitel after SADIA's own collecting licence was cancelled in August 2024; and (5) whether AUDAC's appeal to Angola's Minister of Culture, threatened within five days of the 8 August 2024 press conference, was ever answered. This desk searched for 2022 to 2026 developments on each of these points and found none in Angolan press.
A SEPARATE, EARLIER EXPANSÃO REPORT EXISTS AND INFORMS BUT IS NOT THE SOURCE OF THIS RECORD'S CENTRAL FIGURE: "SADIA culpa Unitel e DSTv por falhar meta de receita de 200 milhões Kz em 2020" reports SADIA blaming Unitel and DSTv/MultiChoice for a shortfall against a 200 million kwanza collection target in 2020, read for context on the dispute's origin, not relied on for the 453 million kwanza figure, which comes from the later article cited above.
Angola’s copyright regulator ruled in 2021 that Unitel, the country’s largest mobile operator, owed collecting society SADIA 453 million kwanza in unpaid music royalties. Three years later, the same regulator cancelled SADIA’s own licence to collect anything at all. No source checked for this record shows Unitel ever paid, and no source shows what happened to the claim once SADIA’s authority to collect on composers’ behalf was taken away.
A ringback tone and a music app, and a 453 million kwanza bill
SADIA (Sociedade Angolana de Direitos de Autor), Angola’s original music copyright collecting society, notified Unitel in June 2020 that it owed royalties for musical works used in two Unitel services: “Toque de Espera,” a paid ringback-tone product, and “Kisom,” a music app. By the time Angolan business newspaper Expansão reported on the dispute on 1 August 2021, the unpaid sum had grown to 453 million kwanza, calculated from that first notification. Expansão reported that SENADIAC, the Serviço Nacional de Direitos de Autor e Conexos, the Ministry of Culture body that licenses Angola’s collecting societies, had ruled in SADIA’s favour. SENADIAC’s stated reasoning, per Expansão: none of the six representatives Unitel named as already being paid, LS Republicano, Go Edições, Sygnius, Arca Velha, Bom Som and Grupo Chialo, was a certified collective-management entity, and the rights in question had been entrusted to SADIA.
Unitel did not accept the ruling. Its reported position was that it already paid artists’ representatives directly, and that it would pay SADIA only if SADIA proved the specific artists were registered exclusively with it and had not already been compensated through someone else. SADIA told Expansão it supplied that proof without result, and took the dispute further, reporting Unitel to Apple, which hosts Kisom. A follow-up report on 20 December 2021 said Apple had asked Unitel for proof of royalty payment; Unitel supplied a contract with LS Republicano, and Apple did not accept it.
That is where the documented trail stops. This desk searched specifically for a resolution between 2022 and 2026, a court filing, a settlement, a confirmed payment, and found none in Angolan press.
The regulator that ruled for SADIA later shut SADIA down
On 8 August 2024, Angolan newspaper O País reported that SENADIAC, the same body that had ruled in SADIA’s favour on the Unitel claim, cancelled the collective-management authorisation it had granted SADIA in September 2019. The stated ground: SADIA had not performed its functions as a collecting society for almost two years. Two other Angolan societies, UNAC-SA and AUDAC, were separately suspended for 180 days in the same action, over what SENADIAC described as serious irregularities in collecting and distributing royalties, and a failure to file periodic reports required under Angolan law. AUDAC’s director-general publicly disputed SENADIAC’s authority to act without a ministerial order and said AUDAC would sue if the Minister of Culture did not respond to an appeal within five days. This desk found no report of how that appeal, or any equivalent step by SADIA, was resolved.
What this record does not establish
Three things are not established by any document this desk found, and are not guessed at here: whether Unitel ever paid any part of the 453 million kwanza, to SADIA or to anyone else; whether the “almost two years” of non-performance SENADIAC cited in 2024 overlaps with the Unitel dispute period; and what became of SADIA’s claim once its own licence to collect was cancelled. The underlying composers’ ownership of their own songs is not in question in any of this; what is unresolved is who, if anyone, is or was entitled to collect on their behalf, and whether they were ever paid.
Full long-form treatment, including what this means for Angolan songwriters: Angola’s Regulator Backed a Songwriter’s Society Against a Telecom Giant. Then It Shut the Society Down.
