Fashion Law in African Film: What the Law Protects and What It Doesn't

Image Credit: The Hollywood Reporter

The legal questions that surround costume ownership, designer protections, and intellectual property in film are not unique to Hollywood. They arise wherever film is made, wherever costume designers create original work for a production, and wherever the resulting garments and the commercial value they carry become subject to competing claims. In Africa, those questions arise daily across three of the continent's most active and culturally significant film industries: Nollywood in Nigeria, Ghallywood in Ghana, and Riverwood in Kenya.

Each of these industries has a distinct legal framework governing intellectual property. Each has a growing commercial ecosystem in which costume and fashion play an increasingly visible role. And each presents a set of legal gaps, some documented, some inferred from the structure of the law, that fashion lawyers practising on the continent will need to understand and, in time, address.

This article examines each industry in turn, sets out what the applicable IP law provides, and identifies where the law leaves the costume designer, the stylist, and the production house without adequate protection.

I. Nollywood (Nigeria): A Maturing Industry, an Evolving Legal Framework

Nollywood is, by most measures, one of the most significant film industries in the world. It is the third-largest globally in terms of annual output and the second-largest employer in Nigeria after agriculture. The industry's cultural influence in Africa and in the diaspora is substantial, but its legal infrastructure has taken longer to develop.

For most of its modern history, Nollywood operated under the Copyright Act of 1988, a framework that predated the digital era and was widely acknowledged as inadequate to the industry's realities. In 2022, Nigeria enacted a new Copyright Act, which was signed into law in 2023 and represents a significant modernisation of the country's IP framework. The Act extends protection to the full range of creative works produced in the film context and introduces provisions relevant to digital distribution, including piracy protections that reflect the current landscape of streaming and online distribution.

Under the Copyright Act 2022, copyright protection in Nigeria attaches automatically upon the creation of an eligible work. However, registration with the Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC) is strongly advisable, as it creates a presumption of authorship and ownership under Section 20 of the Act, which is practically valuable in the event of a dispute. For costume designers working on Nollywood productions, this means that original costume designs may, in principle, be eligible for copyright protection as artistic works. The more complex question, however, is what happens to that copyright when the designer is engaged by a production house.

The Act retains provisions governing works made in the course of employment, under which copyright in a work created by an employee vests in the employer, absent a contractual provision to the contrary. This is broadly analogous to the work-for-hire framework discussed earlier in this series. For costume designers engaged as freelancers or independent contractors, the position is less clear and depends heavily on the terms of any written agreement. Where no written agreement exists, the ownership question is unresolved and potentially the subject of dispute.

The fashion dimensions of Nollywood are significant and growing. Contemporary Nollywood productions, particularly those produced for streaming platforms, including Netflix, which has made a substantial investment in Nigerian content, engage professional costume designers and stylists whose work materially contributes to the production's commercial and cultural profile. The question of who owns the resulting designs and on what terms they may be exploited is one that the industry has not yet systematically addressed.

CASE IN POINT

The Motion Picture Council of Nigeria Bill (MOPICON Bill), first introduced in 2006 and subject to ongoing legislative debate, has been proposed as a framework for professionalising and regulating the Nigerian film industry, including provisions to establish minimum standards for creative professionals. The Bill has not yet been enacted, primarily due to disagreements within the industry about its scope and governance structure. If passed, it would represent a significant step toward the kind of guild-equivalent protections that costume designers in Hollywood access through the Costume Designers Guild. Its absence leaves a meaningful gap in the professional and legal infrastructure supporting Nigeria's creative workforce.

II. Ghallywood (Ghana): Folklore Protection and the Cultural Dimension

Ghana's film industry, also known as Ghallywood, operates under the Copyright Act 2005 (Act 690), which governs the protection of creative works in Ghana. As with Nigeria, copyright protection in Ghana attaches automatically upon the creation of a qualifying work. The Act covers a broad range of creative works, including audiovisual, artistic, and literary works, all of which are relevant to the film production context.

What makes Ghana's copyright framework particularly significant for fashion lawyers is a provision that does not appear in equivalent form in most other African copyright statutes: the protection of folklore. Under the Copyright Act 2005, "folklore" is defined to include the literary, artistic, and scientific expressions belonging to the cultural heritage of Ghana, expressly including Kente and Adinkra designs where the author is unknown. The rights in folklore are vested in the President of Ghana on behalf of and in trust for the people of the Republic. Any person intending to use folklore for commercial purposes must obtain permission and pay a fee set by the relevant board.

For fashion lawyers, this provision has direct practical implications. A film production, domestic or international, that incorporates Kente or Adinkra patterns into its costume design is engaging with legally protected cultural expressions. The failure to obtain the requisite permission is not merely an ethical question; it may constitute a legal infringement under Ghanaian law. This is a provision that practitioners advising on productions set in or drawing on Ghanaian cultural material need to be aware of.

Beyond folklore protection, Ghallywood faces many of the same structural challenges as Nollywood. There is no formal guild structure equivalent to the Costume Designers Guild providing minimum standards, credit protections, or residual entitlements for costume designers. The industry has a long tradition of informal production practices, and the formalisation of creative professional relationships remains uneven.

III. Riverwood (Kenya): A Framework in Development

Kenya's film industry, known informally as Riverwood, after the River Road area of Nairobi where much of its early production infrastructure was concentrated, is smaller in output than Nollywood or Ghallywood, but is growing in ambition and international reach. Kenyan productions, including County 49, 40 Sticks, and Country Queen, have appeared on international streaming platforms, and the industry is increasingly engaging professional creative talent across all departments, including costume design.

Copyright in Kenya is governed by the Copyright Act, Cap 130 (No. 12 of 2001, as amended in 2022), administered by the Kenya Copyright Board (KECOBO). As with Nigeria and Ghana, copyright protection in Kenya attaches automatically upon fixation of a work in a tangible medium; registration is voluntary but advisable, as it provides evidentiary benefit in any subsequent dispute. The Act protects a range of eligible works, including artistic and audiovisual works, both of which are relevant to the context of costume design.

Kenya's copyright framework also provides for voluntary registration through the Kenya National Rights Registry Portal, administered by KECOBO. In the event of a copyright dispute, a certificate of registration serves as evidence of ownership, a practical advantage that costume designers working on Kenyan productions would be well-advised to utilise where their designs meet the threshold of originality required for protection.

Kenya is also notable for a proposed Intellectual Property Bill, which, if enacted, would consolidate existing IP laws and streamline enforcement by establishing a dedicated Intellectual Property Office of Kenya (IPOK). Whether this consolidation will specifically address the needs of creative professionals in the film and fashion sectors remains to be seen. What is clear is that the legal framework is in active development, and the profession of fashion law has an opportunity to contribute to its unfolding.

As with Nollywood and Ghallywood, the gap between the legal framework as it exists on paper and the practical realities of the Kenyan film industry is significant. There is no guild structure for costume designers. The use of written agreements that clearly address IP ownership, credit, and post-production rights is not yet standard practice. And the enforcement infrastructure is not yet commensurate with the scale of the challenge.

IV. The Gaps the Law Has Not Yet Answered

Across all three jurisdictions, several legal questions remain inadequately addressed. They are worth naming clearly, because they define the frontier of fashion law practice in African film.

The first is costume ownership in the absence of a written agreement. In Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya, where a costume designer is engaged without a written contract that specifies IP ownership, the applicable legal position is uncertain. The default rules vary by jurisdiction and by the nature of the engagement, but the practical effect in each case is that ownership becomes a matter of dispute rather than a matter of documented agreement. This is a problem that exists at the contracting stage, not the litigation stage, and it is where fashion lawyers can add the most immediate value.

The second is the absence of formal credit protections for costume designers. None of the three jurisdictions has a statutory or guild-enforced minimum credit standard for costume designers working in film. Where credit is disputed or withheld, the available legal remedies are generally contractual.

The third is the treatment of culturally significant costume elements. Ghana's folklore provision offers the most developed framework in this area, but its practical enforcement in the film-production context is poorly documented. Nigeria and Kenya do not have equivalent provisions that specifically protect traditional cultural expressions in the context of film costumes. As African film increasingly draws on and showcases traditional dress and textile heritage, to global audiences, on international platforms, the question of who controls and benefits from that showcasing becomes more commercially and legally significant.

These gaps reflect the pace of legal development relative to industry growth. The fashion lawyer's role in this context is to understand those gaps, advise clients accordingly, and help close them.

What This Means in Practice

For fashion lawyers advising on African film productions, the immediate practical implication of this analysis is clear. The legal frameworks in Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya provide a foundation for protecting the intellectual property of costume designers. What those frameworks do not provide, and what legal counsel must supply, is the contractual infrastructure that makes those protections real in the context of each production.

That means written agreements that clearly address IP ownership at the outset. It means advising costume designers to register their original works with the relevant copyright authority in their jurisdiction. It means understanding the folklore provisions in Ghana and their implications for productions that draw on Ghanaian cultural textile traditions. And it means being alert to the evolving legislative landscape and understanding how those developments may change the legal position for creative professionals in African film.

The legal questions raised by fashion and film arise wherever film is made and wherever costume designers create original work. On this continent, the legal frameworks to answer those questions are available, but the legal professionals equipped to apply them in the film context are still relatively few. That is the gap this series and FLAA's broader work exist to address.

This article is part of the Fashion Law & Entertainment Series produced by FLAA Academy (African Fashion Law Academy). FLAA Academy is a professional legal education programme dedicated to building expertise in fashion law across Africa.

References: Nigerian Copyright Act 2022; Ghana Copyright Act 2005 (Act 690); Kenya Copyright Act Cap 130 (No. 12 of 2001, as amended 2022); WIPO Lex; Kenya Copyright Board (KECOBO); Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC).