page 30
Article 138: The certificate holder shall also be entitled to assign or bequeath the utility
model and to sign licensing contracts.
Article 139: The holder of the utility model certificate shall be entitled to institute judicial
proceedings before the competent judge against any party who counterfeits a
utility model certificate by performing, without his consent, one of the acts
which are mentioned in Article 137 or which make it likely that counterfeiting
will be committed.
Section 8. Limitation of rights conferred by utility model certificates
Article 140: The rights arising from a utility model certificate shall not cover:
1. acts relating to goods placed on sale in Burundi or in any other country by the
holder of the utility model certificate or with his consent which lead to the
exhaustion of the rights of the holder of the utility model certificate;
2. the use of goods on board aircraft, land vehicles or foreign vessels which
enter, temporarily or accidentally, the airspace, territory or waters of Burundi;
3. acts relating to utility model certificates which are performed solely for
purposes of experimentation in the case of scientific and technical research;
4. acts performed by any party who, in good faith, before the date of filing or, if
priority is claimed, on the date of priority of the application on the basis of
which the certificate is granted, used the utility model certificate or made
effective and serious preparations to use it in the case of acts which do not
differ in terms of their nature or purpose from the previous effective or
envisaged use;
5. acts by a person who makes, manufactures, uses or sells a utility model
certificate solely for purposes which are reasonably related to the gathering
and transmission of information required by a law in Burundi or a country
other than Burundi regulating the manufacture, use or sale of any product.
Article 141: The user’s right referred to in Article 140 may only be transferred or devolved
with the firm or the company or the part of the firm or company in which the use
or preparations for use took place.
Article 142: Without prejudice to the provisions of Article 140, the Minister responsible for
trade shall be entitled to declare on his own initiative or at the request of any
interested party that the rights conferred by the utility model certificate have
been exhausted and to authorize third parties to import the product produced
directly or indirectly by means of a utility model certificate from another
territory if this product is not available in the territory of Burundi or is available
in insufficient quantity or quality to meet local demand or at prices which the
Minister deems abusive or on any other grounds of public interest, including
anti-competitive practices, provided that: