President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s Special Envoy and Ambassador at Large to Europe and the Americas Uebert Angel has reportedly failed in his attempt to have YouTube remove “Gold Mafia” content from several accounts.
“Gold Mafia” is a term used to describe a group of smugglers and money launderers including high-ranking officials from Zimbabwe.
Angel featured prominently in the four-part documentary by Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) where he offered to use his diplomatic cover to carry large volumes of dirty cash into Zimbabwe as part of a laundering operation also involving gold smuggling.
According to Team Pachedu, “YouTube refused to be bulldozed” into removing the content by Angel but “instead, YouTube has now closed Uebert Angel’s main YouTube channel UebertAngelGNW.” Added Team Pachedu:
Google has terminated Uebert Angel’s 25-year-old YouTube account for violating the Terms of Service.
Uebert has been filing multiple DMCA copyright claims on YouTube accounts that reported on the Gold Mafia, but Google has been insisting on the fair usage policy.
Team Pachedu also published a letter written by YouTube addressed to Angel giving reasons why they refused to remove the content from the platform. Reads the letter:
Hi Uebert Angel,
We are concerned that your copyright notification may not be valid for some or all of the videos identified in your notification.
Please keep in mind that in many countries, it is legal to use copyrighted works in specific ways without the owner’s authorization, particularly for transformative purposes such as news reporting, parody, commentary, or review.
Some countries protect such uses under doctrines of “fair use” or “fair dealing,” while others allow for specific exceptions to copyright protection.
If you still believe your copyright is infringed by the YouTube video(s) identified in your notification, please explain in detail why you think so.
We ask that you provide more detail than was included in your initial notice. Here are questions you may wish to consider:
How much of your copyrighted work is used? How is the market for your original work affected by this use? Does this use significantly transform your original work, or does it serve the same purpose? Does this use fall into an exception to copyright protection? Please note that we may share your response with the uploader(s).
Angel is also a self-proclaimed prophet and founder and leader of Good News Church. He claims he can heal the sick and predict the outcomes of elections and football matches. The church has branches in 15 countries.
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