Ra­jiv Surats­ingh

Sports Cor­re­spon­dent

The “So­ca War­riors” nick­name has been a pow­er­ful sym­bol of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s foot­ball pride for some time now. How­ev­er, the dis­tin­guished ti­tle is now at the cen­tre of con­tro­ver­sy. The de­bate has shift­ed from the foot­ball field to the of­fices of David Nakhid, the Par­lia­men­tary Sec­re­tary in the Min­istry of Sport and Youth Af­fairs, who is will­ing to work to re­solve the dis­pute over the “So­ca War­riors” nick­name for the Trinidad and To­ba­go na­tion­al foot­ball team. The T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion (TTFA) and for­mer sports broad­cast­er Sel­wyn Melville, who holds the trade­mark rights to the name, have been un­able to reach an agree­ment. Nakhid, a for­mer na­tion­al play­er of the T&T se­nior men’s team, has called a meet­ing to dis­cuss the mat­ter and has em­pha­sised the im­por­tance of the nick­name to the na­tion­al iden­ti­ty and brand.

There are new le­gal ques­tions be­ing raised about who owns the name and whether that own­er­ship is still valid.

At­tor­ney-at-law and in­tel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty ex­pert Dr Emir Crowne has weighed in on the dis­pute in which Melville, the reg­is­tered own­er of the “So­ca War­riors” trade­mark, has long as­sert­ed his rights over the name, hav­ing reg­is­tered the trade­mark af­ter Trinidad and To­ba­go’s his­toric qual­i­fi­ca­tion for the 2006 FI­FA World Cup.

How­ev­er, Dr Crowne is en­cour­ag­ing deep­er scruti­ny in­to the le­git­i­ma­cy and sus­tain­abil­i­ty of that claim.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia Sports yes­ter­day via What­sApp, he said, “Trade­marks pro­tect spe­cif­ic cat­e­gories of goods and ser­vices,” Dr Crowne ex­plained. “When one looks at the So­ca War­riors trade­mark, it cov­ers a wide va­ri­ety. One needs to ques­tion whether the wide va­ri­ety of goods and ser­vices promised by the So­ca War­riors trade­mark have been ful­filled.”

In in­tel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty law, reg­is­tra­tion alone is not enough. A trade­mark must be ac­tive­ly used in the mar­ket­place in con­nec­tion with the goods and ser­vices for which it is reg­is­tered. Fail­ure to do so over time can open the door for re­vo­ca­tion.

He ex­plained, “Trade­marks are premised on use,” Dr Crowne con­tin­ued. “In the ab­sence of us­ing a trade­mark for the goods and ser­vices for which it is reg­is­tered, there is a process in which the trade­mark can be re­voked.”

That prin­ci­ple could prove piv­otal in the on­go­ing stale­mate. While Melville main­tains le­gal own­er­ship of the name, the TTFA and the broad­er pub­lic have wide­ly adopt­ed “So­ca War­riors” as the un­of­fi­cial, and at times of­fi­cial, iden­ti­ty of the na­tion­al men’s foot­ball team. From pro­mo­tion­al cam­paigns to mer­chan­dise and match com­men­tary, the name is deeply em­bed­ded in the na­tion’s sport­ing cul­ture.

How­ev­er, Crowne sug­gests that wide­spread cul­tur­al adop­tion does not over­ride le­gal oblig­a­tion or re­place prop­er use un­der the terms of trade­mark law.

“It’s not just about whether you have a trade­mark. It’s about whether you’re ac­tu­al­ly us­ing it in con­nec­tion with what you claimed when you reg­is­tered it,” he said.

Crowne be­lieves this sit­u­a­tion in­tro­duces “an­oth­er di­men­sion” to the con­flict be­tween Melville and the TTFA, one that de­mands le­gal ex­am­i­na­tion, not just emo­tion­al or his­tor­i­cal al­le­giance.

This isn’t the first time the TTFA has found it­self en­tan­gled in brand­ing and le­gal rights is­sues, but the So­ca War­riors de­bate touch­es a na­tion­al nerve. The name is more than a la­bel; it’s a ral­ly­ing cry, a cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty, and a piece of the na­tion’s foot­balling his­to­ry.

Whether that iden­ti­ty re­mains pro­tect­ed by trade­mark law or is sub­ject to le­gal chal­lenge is now a ques­tion for the courts, not just for the fans in the stands.

As the TTFA and Melville con­tin­ue to hold op­pos­ing po­si­tions, the fu­ture of the “So­ca War­riors” name may soon de­pend not on who coined it or who pop­u­larised it but on who can prove right­ful and le­gal use.

Last Fri­day, for­mer Trinidad Broad­cast­ing Com­pa­ny (TBC) man­ag­er Steve Dip­nar­ine joined the im­passe and stat­ed via press re­lease that he was the one who coined the phrase ‘So­ca War­riors’.

The TTFA has since launched a re­brand­ing cam­paign, invit­ing the pub­lic to sug­gest a new name that re­flects the spir­it, pride, cul­ture, and strength of the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go. Nakhid’s ef­forts aim to find a com­pro­mise that re­spects the lega­cy of the “So­ca War­riors” and en­sures the team’s con­tin­ued suc­cess and recog­ni­tion on the in­ter­na­tion­al stage.