Zimbo’s denied talent show by Fremantle

Published on: 15th October, 2009

We read with surprise an article in the New Zimbabwe.com purporting Fremantle has pulled the plug to the production of Zim Idol and that Fremantle was advising the Zimbabwean public to stop associating themselves with Zim Idol.

Zim Idol is a people’s Project and will continue to be produced as planned for the people of Zimbabwe until Fremantle comes up with an amicable proposition to salvage the situation as we have always asked them to do after what they claimed to be a mistake by one of their officers even though they had all the time to rectify it

We have always advised Fremantle that cases like the ones they are bringing us are better resolved by a court of law. Being law abiding citizens, before launching the Zim idol music talent show we, the Zim idol directors and former directors followed the normal law channels and approached 19 media and Fremantle to get either authorisation and/or a licence partnership to run Zim idol internationally in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, SA and in Zimbabwe.

This was based on the fact that 19 media and Fremantle are jointly running the international idols format and brand. We went through a number of channels initially and ended up speaking to a Ms Louise Toner who advised both on email and on the phone she was the right person to speak to. We had spent several weeks phoning both America and UK before we were finally referred to Ms Louise Toner by 19media. We have never worked outside the law. We even talked to Multi Choice South Africa and Waterfront Production in South Africa who hold the license in South Africa. They advised us that no one in the region had airing rights in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe laws require foreign companies to give 51% shares to local or indigenous companies for them to be able to operate so we assumed that was the reason why they could not get airing rights or run the idols show in Zimbabwe.

After days of deliberating back and forwards with Fremantle, we were asked to send in our application which we had already prepared- a 7 page document.  A couple of days later on, we made follow ups on the application which they advised they were still going through.

They then replied to us stating: “However, you do not provide details of your proposal (licence fee, licence period, number of exhibitions etc.). I look forward to receiving this information.” We amended our application and stated we were applying to run the show in the 6 countries already listed including the UK. We sent back a full proposal requesting for either authority or a full licence that includes full manpower and resource support from Fremantle in exchange of a 5%  licence fee from revenues of the show with a 15% percent going straight into Zimbabwe AIDS and orphanage and charities, including the NgomaHuru school of music for the blind in Masvingo. We also made it clear that we were applying for a 10 year licence.

When staff at Fremantle responded on the 24th of July 2009, we sent the response e-mail authorising us to produce the show to Zimbabwean papers Including Newzimbabwe.com in order for them to report to the public. We have never made it a secret. The same happened with all our potential sponsors and artists. We have never deceived nor lied to the Zimbabwean public as seems to be insinuated by the letter from Fremantle to NewZimbabwe.com.

In the same letter they advised that they would not be pursuing part of our application, the partnership as they had other partners in place but would look at it again after the return of Jamie Lynn (Director of Marketing) by the end of July as he was travelling extensively. With regards to the other part for the show authorisation, they added: “In the meantime, please do proceed with the production of the show under any circumstances”

We immediately rolled out our production plan which included acquiring sponsors, partners, judges, artists, venues, funds, loans and a whole lot of other things. It was later on that they wrote to us demanding that we stop producing Zim Idol as we did not have the authority to do so from them. We thought they were joking and advised them they had authorised us to go ahead with the show.

Again they did not believe us until we forwarded them the e-mail by Ms Tonner. Mr Jamie Lynn went ballistic telling us that Ms Tonner was a junior officer who was not authorised to do as she did. Further verbal threats were made which we reported to the police in Leicester. The police advised us not to go for a meeting that Mr Lynn had called us to attend in London that same week.

Although there could be mistakes like this in life, there was also ample time to rectify or even notice it before it was sent off. A company of this magnitude does not just have a single individual in charge of sensitive outgoing communications or let such sensitive information leave without being proof read, checked or sanctioned by a senior member of the team let alone the number of email and telephone communication prior to their authorisation email.

Being law abiding citizens, we then simply wrote appreciating their mistake and asking what the company is proposing to address this pending dispute.

There were a lot of email communication between us and Fremantle and telephone communication from Jamie Lynn with regards to this and all these (email) are documented. Throughout communication, in spite of accepting their mistake, Fremantle kept putting the blame on us with no suggested way to salvage the situation.

Zim Idol eventually proposed that for the matter to end immediately, Fremantle should unequivocally issue an apology to the people of Zimbabwe and NgomaHuru School of music for the blind in Masvingo as well as the Aids orphans whom would have benefited from the Zim idol music talent show.  Fremantle adamantly refused to do so even though they agreed to the same mistake by their staff.

Zim Idol asked them again to suggest an amicable business proposition or solution to salvage the situation as a way to move forward also pointing the fact that we could be the 51% bridge to partner with in Zimbabwe based on the foreign company percentages. They turned a deaf ear to that and went on to issue continuous and ludicrous threats against Zim Idol members and disruptions to the show and its launch parties. Telephone calls which were back tracked to Fremantle offices were made to the Launch party venue and we were forced to postpone the lauch party.

Zim Idol insisted it had done everything so far in good faith. We then had to accept Fremantle `s final treats to take the matter  for resolution in the courts and let the fate for many talented Zimbabwean  be decided by a judge in a court of law.

The court treats are still yet to be carried out by Fremantle. It seems now Fremantle has decided to take an extra judiciary step by bringing the case to the world media by approaching a Zimbabwean on line newspaper on the 6th of October in search of justice and turning their back on the proper legal channels of the English courts. One wonders what circus this is.

This has been the case since then and emails have been exchanged with threats to surrender the domain and destroy the website which we have stated that we cannot do as the domain rightfully belongs to Zim Idol LTD. We have asked Fremantle, if it meant so much to them as a viable business, why they did not register and protect the domain names that they are forcing us to give up to them (i.e. zimidol.com, zimidols.com, zimbabweidol.com, zimbabweidols.com) if they indeed felt it was their trademark and super brand. These domains are only £5/year and meant nothing to such a big organisation. The 4 domains were only registered between May and July this year. In our previous email to them, we have even brought them to the attention of why they are not going ahead to secure other related domain names like zimbabweanidol.com, zambiaidol.com, botswanaidol.com, ugandaidol.com, mozambiqueidol.com etc. As we write, all these and many more are still not registered 3 months later. In the domain world, one can easily register a domain like zimidol.com or zambiaidol and either use it for a puppet show website or tomatoe selling website hence are free to be registered or bought by anyone just like we did. One wonders why they are waiting on these strategic brand registrations, either its because they want to later embarrass that country and its people through legal wrangles or to use those people and their country in their bag of media parade and publicity stunts for mega bucks.

The Zimbabwean public cannot be prejudiced by wilful mistakes by Fremantle. We asked Fremantle to suggest ways to salvage the mistake they had made which they had all the time on earth to rectify. People of Zimbabwe deserve a right to a talent show just like all the other countries running the idols.

We have now come to know Fremantle treating African contracts as crap; they pulled the plug on our Eric Moyo when he actually won East and Southern African Idols show. Eric Moyo remains without an honoured contract from Fremantle and its sister company Sony BMG a year and half after being crowned. He is being paraded on their website as the winner but with nothing to show for it, while the true victors are Fremantle.

It is only fair that Zimbabweans are given the opportunity to do their own idols or singing talent show than for it to be given to another country like South Africa to produce the show for them just like they(South Africa) are doing for other African countries.

As we have stated and continue to state, we are only waiting to hear an amicable solution to the mistake caused by Fremantle. We can not suffer and be threatened at the expense of their mistake. An amicable solution will see this case go to rest else the court of law will decide our fate.

Readers Comments