THE Court of Appeal sitting in Lagos has dismissed an appeal filed by the Copyright Society of Nigeria (COSON) challenging the refusal of the Federal High Court to grant an interlocutory injunction restraining the Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC) from interfering with its operations.

In a unanimous judgment delivered on July 9, 2026, which was obtained by The Guardian yesterday, a three-member panel led by Justice Polycarp Terna Kwahar, with Justices F.A. Ojo and M.S. Hassan, upheld the December 1, 2021, ruling of the Federal High Court and awarded costs of N200,000 against COSON.

The appeal arose from Suit No. FHC/L/CS/425/2020 in which COSON sought an interlocutory injunction to prevent the NCC from revoking its operating licence, interfering with its internal management, bank accounts, funds, audits and operations, or preventing it and its members from earning income from their intellectual property pending the determination of the substantive suit.
 
The Federal High Court had declined the application because the issues raised formed the foundation of the substantive case and that an interlocutory injunction could not be granted against a completed act.
   
Dissatisfied with that decision, COSON appealed, arguing that the trial court wrongly concluded that its licence had been revoked and, in doing so, prematurely determined the central issue in the substantive suit.
 
The society maintained that the NCC lacked the statutory power to unilaterally suspend or revoke its operating licence without first obtaining a court order. It also argued that what existed was an unlawful suspension rather than a revocation and that the lower court failed to consider the established legal principles governing the grant of interlocutory injunctions.
 
The NCC, however, urged the appellate court to dismiss the appeal, insisting that COSON’s operating licence had expired by effluxion of time in May 2019 after being suspended in 2018 for allegedly failing to comply with regulatory directives.
 
The Commission argued that since the licence had already expired before the suit and the motion for injunction were filed, there was no existing licence capable of being revoked or protected by an interlocutory order.
 
Delivering the lead judgment, Justice Kwahar held that the evidence before the court showed that COSON’s licence had first been suspended and later expired under the provisions of the Copyright (Collective Management Organisations) Regulations, 2007.
 
The court held that only an existing and valid licence could be revoked, stressing that there was no basis for granting an injunction restraining the Commission from revoking a licence that no longer existed.