Deal sheet
- Status
- Contested and unresolved: injunction granted October 2013, lifted March 2014, no final ruling on the underlying contract obtained from any source fetched for this record.
- Type
- Settlement
- Parties
- Chocolate City Group
- Rights covered
- SCOPE: This record covers a 2013-2014 contract dispute between Brymo (Olawale Ashimi/Olofọrọ) and Chocolate City Group over whether his recording contract, said by the label to run to 2016, remained binding. It does not cover any later Brymo deal; he has released independently since.
WHAT THE SOURCES ESTABLISH:
– On or around 21 October 2013, Chocolate City obtained a court injunction restraining Brymo from "recording, releasing, distributing any composition, song, musical works or carrying out any activity as a recording or performing artist through or for the benefit of any person or organisation other than Chocolate City" pending determination of a substantive suit. Chocolate City's position, reported at the time, was that Brymo's contract remained valid until 2016. Brymo publicly denied the injunction's validity on social media the same period.
– On 3 March 2014, Justice Buba I.N at the Federal High Court, Ikoyi, lifted the injunction, reasoning that the plaintiff (Chocolate City) could be compensated later in damages, so the defendant (Brymo) was free to work as a singer in the meantime, with the substantive matter still pending and a further hearing set for 19-20 March 2014.
– No source obtained for this record reports a final judgment on the merits of the contract dispute. The suit number, and whether the underlying claim was ever concluded, settled or struck out, were not established from any document actually fetched for this record.PHONOGRAM TRAIL (Apple Music / iTunes, independently checked release by release):
– #TheSonOfaKapenta (released 6 December 2012): copyright line reads "(P) 2012 Chocolate City Music."
– Down (single, released 1 October 2013, from the album Merchants, Dealers & Slaves, released during the injunction period): copyright line reads "(P) 2013 Brymo."
– Klitoris (2016): "(P) 2016 Brymo."
– Oso (released 27 March 2018): "(P) 2018 Brymo."
– 9: Esan (released 8 September 2021): "(P) 2021 Olawale Olofọrọ."
– Theta (released 27 May 2022): "(P) 2022 Olawale Olofọrọ."WHAT THIS MEANS: the only release Chocolate City is credited as owning on Apple's own catalogue data is the 2012 album that predates the dispute. Every subsequent release, including the single put out while the injunction was still in force, carries a Brymo or Olawale Olofọrọ phonogram credit. That is a release-by-release fact about who Apple's metadata names as rights holder; it is not evidence of what a court decided, and no court decision on the underlying ownership question was obtained.
DISPUTED/UNRESOLVED:
– Whether Chocolate City's 2016 contract-expiry position was ever upheld, rejected, or left undecided by a final ruling: unresolved on the sources obtained.
– The suit number quoted in some secondary trade coverage (reported elsewhere as FHC/L/1422/2013) was not independently verified against a document fetched for this record and is not asserted here.
– Brymo has no company record in this directory and no clearly confirmed registered label of his own for the disputed period; "The Bail Music Company (TML)" appears only as a release credit on a 2019 live album and is not treated here as a verified imprint.SCOPE LIMIT: this record does not state who owns Brymo's 2012-era masters today, does not state whether Chocolate City retains any claim on his post-2013 catalogue, and does not state the outcome of the substantive suit. It states only the injunction, its lifting, and the phonogram credit pattern before and after.
- Territory
- Nigeria
- Announced
- 2013-10-21
- Primary document
- Trade press
- Sources
- myjoyonline.com court report, 21 October 2013 · myjoyonline.com, injunction lifted, 3 March 2014 · blueprint.ng, injunction lifted report · Apple Music, #TheSonOfaKapenta, phonogram credit Chocolate City Music 2012 · Apple Music, Down (single), phonogram credit Brymo 2013 · Apple Music, Klitoris, phonogram credit Brymo 2016 · Apple Music, Oso, phonogram credit Brymo 2018 · Apple Music, 9: Esan, phonogram credit Olawale Olofọrọ 2021 · Apple Music, Theta, phonogram credit Olawale Olofọrọ 2022
Read this before citing: THE SUBSTANTIVE SUIT WAS NOT RESOLVED ON ANY DOCUMENT OBTAINED FOR THIS RECORD. Two court reports were fetched and read: the 21 October 2013 injunction report and the 3 March 2014 report of its lifting by Justice Buba I.N at the Federal High Court, Ikoyi. Neither reports a final judgment on whether Brymo's contract with Chocolate City ran to 2016 as the label maintained. A suit number circulates in some secondary coverage; it was not verified against a document fetched here and is not stated as fact in this record. A Proshare.co article said to carry the suit number could not be fetched (Cloudflare challenge / expired certificate on repeated attempts) and a Premium Times article returned only obfuscated script content, so neither was used as a source. Source type is recorded as "trade" because the primary court filing or judgment itself was not obtained; it must not be upgraded to "filing" unless that document is pulled directly. Brymo has no company record in this directory; he is treated throughout as a named individual, not a corporate party, because no registered personal imprint for the disputed period could be confirmed.
Chocolate City Group won a Nigerian Federal High Court injunction against Brymo on or around 21 October 2013, barring him from recording, releasing or performing for anyone else while the label’s breach-of-contract claim went to trial. The label’s position was that his 2010 contract ran to 2016. The injunction lasted five months. On 3 March 2014, Justice Buba I.N, at the Federal High Court in Ikoyi, lifted it, holding that Chocolate City could be compensated later in damages if it won, so there was no reason to keep Brymo from working in the meantime. The substantive question, whether the contract actually bound him to 2016, was not decided then and has not surfaced as decided in any document obtained for this record.
The injunction and its lifting
A contemporaneous court report, fetched and read in full, records the injunction’s wording: it restrained Brymo from “recording, releasing, distributing any composition, song, musical works or carrying out any activity as a recording or performing artist through or for the benefit of any person or organisation other than Chocolate City,” pending the suit. Brymo denied its validity publicly within days. A second contemporaneous court report, also fetched and read, together with a separate report of the same hearing, records the 3 March 2014 lifting, the reasoning on damages, and a further hearing date of 19 and 20 March 2014. Neither report, nor any other source checked, records what happened at that later hearing or after it.
The phonogram trail
Apple Music’s own release-by-release credits were checked directly. #TheSonOfaKapenta (2012) carries “(P) 2012 Chocolate City Music.” Down, a single from Merchants, Dealers & Slaves released 1 October 2013 during the injunction period, carries “(P) 2013 Brymo.” Klĭtôrĭs (2016) and Oṣó (2018) carry “(P) Brymo.” 9: Èsan (2021) and Theta (2022) carry “(P) Olawale Olofọrọ.” This is metadata about who a distributor named as rights holder on each release; it is not a court finding, and is not treated as one here.
Scope and limits of this record
This record does not state the outcome of the underlying suit, which was not found decided in any source obtained. It does not state who currently owns Brymo’s pre-2013 masters, or whether Chocolate City retained any claim on his output after the injunction lifted. Brymo carries no company record in this directory; he is treated as a named individual because no registered personal imprint for the disputed period could be confirmed from available sources. Full sourcing detail, including the pages that could not be fetched, is in the caveat field below.
Full narrative treatment, including what this means for other artists on long-form Nigerian label contracts: Chocolate City’s October 2013 Injunction Barred Brymo From Recording for Anyone Else. The Federal High Court Lifted It Five Months Later, and No Final Ruling on His Contract Has Surfaced Since.
