In December 2022, Berlin returned to Nigeria 22 bronzes from the former Kingdom of Benin looted during the colonial era. But five months later, the blurring of the fate of the returned objects is causing some unease in Germany.
At the origin of the disorder, a decree promulgated on March 28 by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who was succeeded in May by Bola Ahmed Tinubu, which confers ownership of the repatriated works to the “oba of Benin” and not to the State. Nigerian. This traditional chief is the heir to the sovereign who reigned over this kingdom in southwestern Nigeria when the bronzes were stolen, during a British colonial expedition at the end of the 19th century. “As the original owner [the oba] shall be responsible for the management of all places where the repatriated objects are domiciled,” the decree states.
When Berlin reached an agreement on the return of around 1,100 bronzes from 20 German collections and museums, the two countries agreed on the importance of making the works accessible to the public. The bronzes are planned to be displayed in a new museum in Benin City, in southern Edo State. What will happen under the presidential decree?
The authorities in the Saxony region are demanding clarification and have put restitution proceedings on hold. Saxony still has 262 Benin bronzes in its museums, the second largest collection in Germany. The German region wants to see “what is the effect of this decree […] and how the new government will proceed”. Before that, “we will not take any new steps,” a spokesman for the state’s culture ministry told AFP.
A reaction greeted with annoyance by the Federal Minister of Culture, Claudia Roth. “What happens to the bronzes now is up to the current owner, and that is the sovereign state of Nigeria,” she told ZDF. “The return of the Benin Bronzes to Nigeria was not subject to conditions,” said German Foreign Ministry spokesman Christopher Burger. But to recall how important it is “that the public continue to have access to the bronzes of Benin after the restitution”.
“Propaganda”
The debate goes beyond the question of where the objects will be exhibited, writes the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. “When works of art are privatized, their interpretation also becomes private,” the liberal daily writes, pointing to historical research that Benin’s former royal family “was not the least involved in the slave trade, including benefited not only the European powers but also the local elites”. The newspaper thus warns against the temptation to erase this aspect in order to present a glorious historical account of the context in which the bronzes were created.
These fears irritate the president of the Prussian Heritage Foundation, Hermann Parzinger, in charge of the Ethnological Museum in Berlin: “Do we really want to return to the attitude of the 1970s, when we Europeans equated the return of cultural goods to Africa to loss, destruction and sale? “, he wrote in early May. Its museum has 530 historical objects from the former kingdom of Benin, including 440 bronzes, considered the most important collection after that of the British Museum in London.
In Nigeria, the president of the government agency responsible for the return of looted works, Abba Isa Tijani, wants to calm the debate. “We want to reassure our partners, museums in Europe: the objects will be accessible to researchers, the public and tourists and cannot be sold,” he told AFP. As for the construction of the Benin City museum, it “continues”. “Benin’s Oba royal family relies on this museum,” he continues.
Peju Layiwola, an art historian and artist in Nigeria, very involved in the battle for the return of the bronzes, castigates a “propaganda which consists in saying that the objects will be lost”. She recalls that the oba always “clearly” indicated that a museum would be established. According to her, this is all just an “excuse not to return the items”.