Swiss authorities on Monday returned 18 Benin Bronzes to Nigeria in a ceremony at the National Museum in Lagos, the latest addition to Nigeria’s growing collection of repatriated treasures. Culture minister, Hannatu Musa Musawa, said at the ceremony that the restitution represents the return of evidence of civilisation that already mastered bronze casting to a standard of technical, artistic, and extremely intricate sophistication before colonisation.
The handover included a bronze bracelet and four Ikom monoliths from the Niger Delta region, seized in Switzerland as part of criminal proceedings and subsequently transferred to the state, according to Switzerland’s federal department of home affairs. The bronzes came from the Ethnographic Museum at the University of Zurich, the Museum Rietberg, and the Musée d’Ethnographie de Genève.
Elisabeth Baume-Schneider, a Swiss federal councillor, said the artefacts returned carry a painful history, as many of them left the Kingdom of Benin, their place of origin, as a result of violence, looting, and deeply unequal power relations. Hundreds of the priceless sculptures and plaques were taken from the royal palace in the Kingdom of Benin after British forces attacked Benin City in 1897, and today they are scattered in museums and private collections across the world.
Musawa said Switzerland’s move should be emulated by every single nation holding African heritage, while restitution has also run into homegrown roadblocks as Nigerian government authorities and Benin’s traditional rulers have at times been at loggerheads over who should have possession of the bronzes. The returned artefacts will now be housed in Nigerian museums for preservation and public display.
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