Facts
Aryeh Movement Limited registered certain literary works with the Kenya Copyright Board (KECOBO) in its own name. In May 2025 one of the contributors complained to KECOBO that the works were hers and had been registered without her consent. Aryeh’s documents described her as a scriptwriter and as an illustrator who curated and adapted AI-generated images. By a letter of 15 July 2025, KECOBO told the parties to agree in writing on their shares of the copyright, failing which the registered work would be expunged within seven days. Aryeh appealed to the Copyright Tribunal, arguing that KECOBO had no power to decide authorship and ownership.
Question
The Tribunal considered whether the appeal was properly brought and whether KECOBO had exceeded its powers by deciding what was in substance a dispute over authorship and ownership. Because the matter arose at the hearing, it also addressed ownership, authorship and copyrightability: whether the works were commissioned works, and whether works generated by artificial intelligence can be protected and owned under the Kenyan Copyright Act, which does not address AI. The works themselves were never put in evidence, but the complainant did not dispute that parts of them were AI-generated.
Decision
In its judgment of 22 August 2025 the five-member Tribunal found the appeal properly brought and held that KECOBO had no jurisdiction to make the findings in its letter. The matter was a dispute under section 48(4)(a) of the Copyright Act and fell outside KECOBO’s power to correct errors, so the decision was set aside in its entirety. The Tribunal noted that a commissioned work requires an agreement under section 31(1). On AI, it made no determination on the works for lack of evidence, but observed that under section 22(3)(a) any aspects of works generated by AI are not eligible for copyright unless the author can demonstrate sufficient human intervention or effort giving the work an original character.
Why it matters
The Tribunal’s statement on AI is an observation, since it made no finding on the works at issue. It nonetheless adopts a human-contribution test, drawing on Thaler v. Perlmutter in the United States, the UK provision on computer-generated works and the CJEU’s Infopaq judgment. Whether a particular AI-assisted work qualifies will turn on a factual inquiry into the human input. The decision also confirms that registration with KECOBO does not by itself confer ownership.