Ghanaian broadcaster and entrepreneur, Serwaa Amihere, has extended a formal apology to the Action Worship Center following a social media uproar triggered by her claim that the church choir had stolen her clothing designs. In a Facebook post, the award-winning journalist accused the church choir of appropriating a design from her clothing company, Office and Co by Serwaa Amihere, after spotting them wearing a pink dress she asserted was her intellectual property.
Serwaa’s outburst gained significant attention on social media, leading some users to investigate the matter further. Eventually, it was revealed through Pinterest that the design Serwaa had alleged as her own was, in fact, an older creation by Chinese designer Lee Jong Suk.
The backlash against Serwaa escalated as she was accused of sourcing designs from the internet and misrepresenting them as her original creations. In response to this revelation, Serwaa Amihere has issued an apology to the Action Worship Center, their customers, and the general public. She also announced that her company would be removing the dress in question from their clothing line.
In her official statement, Serwaa acknowledged the insufficiency of her claim to the intellectual property rights of the Celine dress, attributing the oversight to a gap in their internal IP assurance procedures. She emphasized the company’s commitment to enhancing mechanisms for avoiding IP violations. As a concrete step towards respecting intellectual property rights, the Celine dress has been removed from their clothing line, and a recall has been initiated.
The statement concludes with Serwaa reassuring her valued customers of their commitment to providing high-quality, globally competitive women’s office clothing and accessories.