Zuchu’s Masters Have Carried Seven Different Rightsholder Names Since Her 2020 WCB Wasafi Signing. One Was a UK Company Dissolved in 2021 and Still Credited in 2024

October 10, 2026

Deal sheet

Status

Zuchu (Zuhura Othman Soud) was unveiled as a WCB Wasafi artist on 8 April 2020, confirmed directly by The Citizen (Tanzania), published 9 April 2020. No single ownership event has been announced since. What this record establishes instead is that the phonographic (sound-recording) rightsholder credit printed on her own-artist catalogue has never settled on one name. Reading the full Apple Music catalogue for her artist account (ID 1507830113) directly via Apple's iTunes Lookup API on 10 October 2026, cross-checked against the identical result set on both the US and Tanzania storefronts, and against Deezer's album-level API for a sample of releases spanning the same period, this desk counted at least seven distinct names on the ℗ (phonogram copyright) line of her own-artist releases between 2020 and 2026: "WCB WASAFI" / "WCB Wasafi"; "Ziiki Media" (now dominant); "Wasafi Limited"; "Wasafi Media"; "25 WASAFI LIMITED" (naming Warner Music Africa and Ziiki Media as distributors); her own legal name, "Zuhura Othman Soud"; and her stage name alone, "Zuchu". None of these successive changes was announced by WCB Wasafi, Ziiki Media, Warner Music Group or Zuchu herself in any document this desk obtained. One of the seven names, Wasafi Limited, corresponds to a real, identifiable UK company, number 12346593, which was dissolved by compulsory strike-off on 13 July 2021 after never filing accounts — and the identical name continued to appear on new Zuchu releases for a further two and a half years, from 5 May 2023 to 14 February 2024.

Type

Distribution,Licensing

Parties

WCB Wasafi, Ziiki Media, Wasafi Limited (UK), Warner Music Group

Amount

Not disclosed Not disclosed

Rights covered

Sound-recording (master/phonogram) copyright only. This record does not address, and no source checked speaks to, publishing, songwriter splits, COSOTA registration, or any underlying recording contract between Zuchu and WCB Wasafi. The ℗ line is a printed assertion of who holds or administers the sound-recording right on a given release; it is evidence of what DSPs were told to print, not a substitute for the contract itself, which this desk has not seen and which has not been published by any party.

Reading the full 79-entry Apple Music catalogue for artist ID 1507830113 on 10 October 2026 (identical on the US and Tanzania storefronts), own-artist lead releases carry, chronologically: "Tanzania" as a placeholder copyright value with no named company on several 2020-2022 singles (Apple's own default when no distinct copyright string was supplied); "WCB WASAFI"/"WCB Wasafi" on Shangilia (2 Nov 2020), one catalogue entry for Sukari (20 Jan 2021), one entry for the Zuchu Unplugged EP (5 Mar 2021), the political single Hussein Mwinyi (19 Apr 2024), Baby Mpya (31 May 2025) and Baridi (18 Jan 2026); "Ziiki Media" from I Miss You (15 Jan 2022) onward, becoming the dominant credit by 2024-2026 (Utaniua, Napambana, Two, Antenna, Pwita, Raha, Wale Wale, Peace And Money, Reason, AYE, Bado Nakupenda, I Love You, and one of two catalogue entries for Amanda Remix and for Inama feat. Diamond Platnumz); "Wasafi Limited" on Nani (5 May 2023), Nani Remix (31 May 2023), Honey (28 Jul 2023), Naringa (31 Aug 2023), Chapati (20 Sep 2023), Shika (27 Oct 2023) and Zawadi feat. Dadiposlim (14 Feb 2024) — seven releases, all dated after the UK company of that exact name had already been dissolved; "Wasafi Media" on Amina/Ali Hassan Mwinyi (18 Apr 2024); and, in July-September 2025, a cluster of three different credits on four closely-spaced releases: "Zuhura Othman Soud" on Jembe and Oktoba Tunatiki (25-26 Jul 2025), "Zuchu" alone on the solo single Inama (6 Sep 2025), and, on the featured version of the same Inama single five days later (11 Sep 2025), two separate Apple catalogue entries (collection IDs 1841348228 and 1838508331) carrying two different credits: "25 WASAFI LIMITED distributed exclusively by Warner Music Africa & Ziiki Media" on one, "Ziiki Media" alone on the other. Deezer's separate "label" field (a distributor/handling field, not the phonogram credit) moved on a similar but not identical timeline: "WM South Africa" (2020-2022), "WCB WASAFI" (2020-2021 and intermittently since), "Warner Music Africa" (dominant from 2023), and once, on the solo Inama single, "Pink Deenz", a name this desk could not identify in any public record.

Territory

WCB Wasafi is based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Ziiki Media is based in Sandton, South Africa. Wasafi Limited was a UK-registered company with a London correspondence address (7 Bell Yard, WC2A 2JR) and, after April 2021, a Companies House default address in Cardiff. No source obtained states a contractual rights territory for any of the names on Zuchu's catalogue credit; the recordings are distributed worldwide on Apple Music and Deezer.

Announced

2020-04-08

Primary document

Rights registry

Sources

Read this before citing: A phonogram (℗) credit states who a release was distributed through or who asserts the sound-recording right on paper. It is not, by itself, proof of beneficial ownership, and this record does not treat it as one. It is used here only to describe what is printed, consistently or inconsistently, across six years of one artist's catalogue.

WASAFI LIMITED IDENTITY NOT ESTABLISHED. Companies House lists exactly one UK company ever registered under the name "Wasafi Limited": number 12346593, incorporated 3 December 2019, officers Halima Mudeey Caliyow (director) and Mina Ali (secretary), both with a correspondence address at 7 Bell Yard, London WC2A 2JR — a registered-office address used by numerous unconnected UK companies, not evidence by itself of any link to Diamond Platnumz, WCB Wasafi or Ziiki Media. The company never filed accounts or a confirmation statement, was struck off for filing default (First Gazette 27 April 2021) and dissolved 13 July 2021. Whether this is the same legal entity named on Zuchu's 2023-2024 release credits, a different company registered elsewhere (including Tanzania, whose BRELA register has no public search this desk could access), or a trading name with no registered entity behind it at all, could NOT be established from any document obtained. What is established without ambiguity: no UK company called Wasafi Limited has existed since 13 July 2021, and the identical name appears on new Zuchu releases as late as 14 February 2024.

"25 WASAFI LIMITED" AND "WASAFI MEDIA" ARE NOT UK COMPANIES. A Companies House company-name search for both strings, run 10 October 2026, returned zero results for each. Neither name corresponds to any UK-registered company at the time of writing. No Tanzanian registry check was possible.

"PINK DEENZ" COULD NOT BE IDENTIFIED. This name appears once, in Deezer's label field for the solo Inama single (6 September 2025). It returns no UK company and no identifiable public record of any kind in the sources checked for this record.

TWO LIVE CATALOGUE ENTRIES FOR ONE SINGLE CARRY TWO DIFFERENT CREDITS, RIGHT NOW. Apple Music catalogue IDs 1841348228 and 1838508331 are both titled "Inama (feat. Diamond Platnumz)", both dated 11 September 2025, both confirmed live via direct page fetch on 10 October 2026. One carries "℗ 2025 25 WASAFI LIMITED distributed exclusively by Warner Music Africa & Ziiki Media" in its page markup; the other carries "℗ 2025 Ziiki Media" alone, with no Wasafi or Warner text anywhere in that page's markup. This desk flags, rather than adopts, either as the correct or sole credit for the single. THIS DIRECTLY CONFLICTS WITH A CORRECTION THIS SITE PUBLISHED ON 24 AUGUST 2026 IN A SEPARATE DEAL RECORD (Warner Music/Ziiki/WCB-Wasafi partnership), which stated that rechecking this exact single's page markup "found no such text" referencing 25 Wasafi Limited, and that the credit was "Ziiki Media alone." Re-verification for this record, six weeks later, found the 25 Wasafi Limited text live on one of two catalogue entries for the same single. This desk is not able to determine whether the 24 August check missed the second catalogue entry, whether Apple's metadata changed in the interim, or whether both entries existed throughout and were not both checked. This conflict with the site's own prior correction is recorded here, not resolved, and is being raised for the standards desk.

PUBLISHING NOT ADDRESSED. No source checked states who owns or administers the compositions, songwriter splits, or any COSOTA registration.

UNDERLYING CONTRACT NOT SEEN. The terms of Zuchu's April 2020 WCB Wasafi signing, including whether it assigns masters to the label, to Ziiki Media, or to any other named entity, have never been published by any party and were not obtained for this record.

NO PARTY WAS REACHED FOR COMMENT before publication.

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