Bucharest Court of Appeals recently admitted the plea for illegality in relation to Order no. 2823/1566/2003 issued by the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Public Finances, Annex 4 item 3, whereby the Union of Romanian Composers and Musicologists (UCMR) was appointed as beneficiary of the sums collected as music stamp duty, established by Law no. 35/1994 on literary, cinematography, theatre, music, folklore and plastic art stamps.
This litigation reached the docket of courts of law as a consequence of the action initiated by UCMR against CAT Music, one of the leading record labels in Romania, for the recovery of alleged overdue debts deriving from the obligation to pay the music stamp.
Further to the successful challenge by CAT Music of UCMR’s standing as beneficiary of the sums collected as music stamp duty, the latter could permanently lose this capacity and, implicitly, the right to collect music stamp for all music products traded in Romania, and it will be forced to undergo re-authorization in this respect, in accordance with the procedure stipulated by Law no. 35/1994. This decision would benefit not only CAT Music, but also all record labels in Romania, UCMR launching against them an active legal fight for collecting the music stamp duty. The file reviewing the merits of the case is undergoing the appeal stage, CAT Music also succeeding to obtain, before the court of first instance, dismissal of the action initiated by UCMR.
The team of attorneys having assisted CAT Music in relation to this litigation, as well as in other disputes upheld by UCMR, succeeding, inter alia, to prove illegality of Order no. 2823/1566/2003 issued by the Ministry of Culture and Religious Affairs and the Ministry Public Finance, forms part of the Intellectual Property and Administrative & Fiscal Litigation departments of Muşat & Asociaţii, Attorneys at Law; among them, Anca Buta Muşat, Viorel Dinu, Paul George Buta and Andrei Georgescu.
