Nigerian Afrobeats superstar David Adeleke, popularly known as Davido, has been served a 21-day ultimatum to appear before the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York to respond to charges of intellectual property theft.
According to legal documents obtained by Peoples Gazette, the suit was filed by four Nigerian artists—Martins Chukwuka Emmanuel, Abel Great Umaru, Kelvin Ayodele Campbell, and David Ovhioghena Umaru—who accused Davido of stealing their 2022 song titled ‘Work’.
The plaintiffs allege that Davido used their track to create his own 2024 release, ‘Strawberry on Ice’, which featured Emmerson Amidu Bockarie, also known as Emmerson. Other co-defendants in the case include Carlos Jenkins, Matthew Quinney, Marques Miles II, and Wynn Records, the label that published and distributed the song.
According to the legal filings, the issue began in January 2022 when the plaintiffs, in good faith, shared a demo of ‘Work’ with Davido as part of a potential collaboration. The group was seeking a breakthrough in the music industry at the time. However, the plaintiffs allege that instead of collaborating, Davido took the song to Emmerson, who then sampled the individual recorded instrumental and vocal elements of ‘Work’ without permission to create “Strawberry on Ice.”
To resolve the matter, the plaintiffs reached out to Davido, and after several months, they were able to secure an agreement on March 14, 2025. The agreement stipulated that Davido would pay $45,000 in settlement, as well as give the plaintiffs 40 percent of the royalties for the underlying composition of “Strawberry on Ice” and 20 percent of the royalties for the sound recording of the song. However, Davido failed to meet the terms of the agreement, despite promising to pay before the agreed-upon March 24 deadline.
In response, the plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against Davido and his co-defendants on April 4 in New York. The plaintiffs are seeking a court ruling that Davido and his co-defendants infringed upon the intellectual property rights of ‘Work.’ They are also seeking $150,000 in damages, as well as the transfer of 40 percent of the compositional copyright and 20 percent of the sound recording copyright of “Strawberry on Ice” to the plaintiffs.
Additionally, they are asking the court to prevent the defendants from further infringing upon the plaintiffs’ copyrights or engaging in actions that would infringe upon their future works.