NY Court Grants Ugandan Promoter Leave To Address Potential Defect In His Lawsuit Against Mavado

A federal judge in New York has granted a Ugandan promoter permission to amend the lawsuit he filed against Mavado over the Jamaican star’s non-performance at a concert in the East African country a decade ago.

Chinedu Ikoroha, of Cee Cee Entertainment Ltd, is seeking the return of over USD $100,000, which he claims was paid to, or otherwise spent on behalf of the Beat and Teach singer, as well as USD $545,000 for lost revenue from ticket sales as a result of the failed concert.

VP Records, which acted as Mavado’s booking agent for the concert via Reggae Planet, was initially included in the complaint filed in 2019. However, the New York-based company subsequently got itself dismissed from the case, leaving Mavado as the sole defendant.

In light of VP’s dismissal, Judge Margo K. Brodie recently raised the issue of whether the US court still had jurisdiction over the case, and pointed out that both Ikoroha and Mavado were “non-US entities/individuals.”

On Thursday (March 30), Brodie granted Ikoroha’s request for leave to amend his complaint, but the judge also noted that the presence of only foreign parties on both sides of the matter “destroys” the jurisdiction established at the start of the case, when VP was a party.

Ikoroha’s amended complaint will likely seek to clarify Mavado’s immigration status in the US, and seek to establish “supplemental jurisdiction” over the singer to allow the lawsuit to proceed.

In a letter to the Court last week, Ikoroha’s lawyer wrote, “While VP Records has been dismissed from this case, that does not get [Mavado] off the hook. Rather, the Court may choose to exercise its discretion and grant supplementary jurisdiction despite the dismissal of the claims that formed the basis for its original jurisdiction.”

On March 30, the Court also dismissed Ikoroha’s motion for summary judgment, without prejudice to renewal following the determination of its jurisdiction to continue presiding over the lawsuit.  The motion had been pending since July 2022.

The dispute revolves around a concert that Mavado was booked to perform in the Ugandan capital city of Kampala on December 29, 2012. However, the deejay did not perform at that show, nor at another on March 29, 2013, the alternative date.

According to court documents obtained by DancehallMag, Ikoroha alleged that he lost USD $60,000 that he paid to Mavado; USD $40,000 allegedly paid to Mavado’s reps for travel, security, and accommodation expenses; and at least USD $250,000 in damages from concert expenses.   

The promoter also claimed that Mavado was aware that he had mortgaged two properties to finance the concert.  He said the properties were also lost due to the concert’s failure. 

Ikoroha subsequently sued Mavado and VP for breach of contract, and leveled a fraud claim against VP (which is now dismissed), after Mavado tried to deny that Reggae Planet was acting on his behalf.

When it cleared its name, VP, among other things, submitted as evidence Mavado’s promotional video for the show, which was part of the agreement once 50 percent of the performance fee was paid.

“When Brooks failed to perform in Uganda as scheduled, the reason given was not that VP lacked authority to bind him.  The reason given was that Brooks had another concert scheduled in Nigeria a few days prior to the Ugandan concert and the Nigerian promoter failed to pay him for the Nigerian concert, such that Brooks decided to cancel everything in Africa,” VP’s attorney stated in the successful motion to dismiss the suit against the label.

VP also pointed out that Mavado apologized on Twitter for missing the December 2012 date, agreed to the makeup concert date in March 2013, and also did another promotional video.

The company was dismissed from the case in September 2020.

Meanwhile, Mavado’s attorney argued that the fact that the December 29, 2012 show did not take place, was not a breach of the Performance Agreement, but that the Ugandan’s alleged failure to make payments for travel and to pay the balance of the deposit fee by November 1, 2012, had voided the Performance Agreement and Mavado’s obligations.

The deejay’s lawyers also had argued that there were conditions beyond his control, pursuant to the terms of the Performance Agreement, “namely that the show Brooks would have been coming from was cancelled due to a third party’s fraudulent conduct, which created a security risk for Brooks.”

With respect to Ikoroha’s statements that Mavado knew that he had mortgaged properties in order to stage the show, the artist’s lawyers said that the promoter had failed to produce competent evidence connecting alleged expenditures to expenses of putting on the concert or that it was his loss.

Regarding lost ticket sales, Mavado’s lawyers contended:  “To the extent Plaintiff is including alleged lost profits in that number, such profits are “merely speculative” and are also not recoverable.    There must be a showing that the particular damages were fairly within the contemplation of the parties to the contract at the time it was made. Courts are hesitant to award lost profits to a new business, because when a business is just starting such future profits are especially speculative and difficult to prove.”

“Plaintiff, which was less than two years old at the time, had literally never promoted another show. Even Plaintiff’s principal had admittedly only had one other prior show through a different entity, which either lost money or broke even.   Plaintiff’s principal had no background in the entertainment industry or as a show promoter, and only worked for a few months with one company to promote non-comparable, smaller events. As such, any alleged lost profits are entirely speculative,” they continued.