Westgate Owners In Court Battle

Piece by: Uncle Chim Tuna
Lifestyle

Sony Holding, the owner of Westgate Shopping Mall, the same mall where al Shabaab terrorists attacked last year are currently in court battling Sony Corporation of Japan in a bid to stop them from registering it's name as a trademark in Kenya.

In a hearing at the Appellate Court, the firm which is incorporated locally as a property management company argues that the High Court acted beyond it's power when it allowed the Japanese firm to challenge the local registration of its trademark 270 days after it had advertised in the industrial property journal.

Westgate owners had their lawyers argue that to do so would be to allow the electronics company to challenge or rather "amend" the Trademarks Act.

Sony's lawyer, Kiragu Kimani, however contended that the Registrar has  the discretion to extend time to any party wishing to challenge a registration and that ruling against it and the registrar would be opening the door for the global company to lodge a suit to protect it's trademark.

The Appeal Court judges Erastus Githinji, John Mwera and William Ouko will deliver their judgement on February 27th 2015.

Source: Business Daily