for just one week. how much will it really get that. we still have time to act i'm going. to accept. it subscribes like. germany has it seems accepted that it must return priceless works of art saluted and stolen during colonial times most spectacularly all foreign teams here in berlin have now agreed to hand back to nigeria at least the share of a huge collection of plundered artifacts known as the bending of bronze it is being called a turning point in germany's approach to its colonial history so on to the point we ask africa's stolen treasures is it time to give them back.

or thanks very much indeed for joining us here on the show and with me in the studio many a concert rule i'm bordereau from the campaign group berlijn postcolonial who says more important than the return of cultural artifacts is the return of the remains of our ancestors also with us is professor donald ventura so jane and decorum continues a cameroon born curator and educator who believes it is no secret that colonialism is in all its forms a crime against humanity and a warm welcome to to the claimed and for apologists corona lens who joins us on the line from mines the western german city she's at the same time president of germany's good institute and she argues that the long overdue return of an. facts

from the colonial period is also an opportunity for cultural exchange between germany and europe and the countries of origin. of so. many occurred let's begin with you if i may in a figure expert say this at least 80 percent of africa's cultural heritage is housed in european museums a lot of it simply gathering dust it seems shocking to me how does it seem to you it is it is also shocking. to me and it leaves me i have been. been davis for quite a long time demanded is. and in that long period where you have been not serious what has changed in the bottle you have. changed back you 5 in the last 5 years at least we common talk kind of

negotiating to give but you not really but what a surprise to me it is way ahead today jim and has decided to gave. the band the bronze back and was the feeling you had a good here was a possible big leap forward in the making he has for me i see this is a step. coming to a process of healing because it will heal the wound so which we have and also it is an aspiration of all the fucks to be returned back to africa and she is there i thought yes my ancestors

remains which housed in museums in clinics in universities all over here in germany will you be a ton back i guess 8 i prayed for that. i see as as touch ok fascinating words thank you very much for sharing that with here and let's go to carol and in mines carla the german foreign minister has come us reflecting what we've just been hearing ses the return of the bed in bronzes represents a turning point in germany's approach to its colonial history is he right. i would say it's a culmination of a long process that has been ongoing with lots of actors one important group is exactly people like miss them borel who are in the diaspora and who have been raising their voice and voicing their concerns which is very important for germans to listen to the 2nd group is the museum people of course then scholars and then

finally politicians and i think that now we are. have a sting the fruits of a long process of negotiation but it is also a new paradigm and when you sing along our process of negotiation why has it taken so long. because it has a lot of actors on each side in germany you don't have the central state as the proprietor or owner of the objects but the local wonder slender and you have even cities who are in charge of museums on the other hand in african countries or in other former colonies too you have various actors at play you have the nigerian central state you have the. nigerian federal states sorry the federal state is the central so i don't always get mixed up with the terminology sorry about that and you have the king and now they have formed

a legacy restoration trust which brings all these actors together and that has really given a big push to gether with the so-called been in darley group which comprises people from austria from great britain from germany and other countries from the netherlands and belgium so i think that has taken a time behind the scenes it wasn't so visible perhaps but now it's out and i'm very happy that it's a big leap forward so it's out it's your happy armed people are talking about on a frontier of decorum go back to dialogue of equals is not possible a dialogue of equals in this post-colonial context. at least we're striving towards that and i think any other thing would be you know problematic we have to speak to each other we have to find common ground and when we find the common ground we have to speak as equals you know we have to dismantle their symmetries that exists to be able to speak as equals you know the power gradients that have been put in place by

the colonial enterprise have to be dismantled and we're all working towards that and i want to say thank you to people. you know and all the other activists that have been going on the streets you know for for decades you know advocating for the restitution repatriation of some of these so-called objects you know so we have to create possibilities of us coming together and roland rightly mentioned that people have been working in the background with all these different groups but we have to bring this things to the foreground and i think this is what is happening at the moment you know it's coming to the fore but this is just the beginning it's the beginning of much more the has to be done you know much more have to be sent back much more communication has to be done and i insist on the fact that he has to be done on an equivocal we you know the so-called. you know german people people discussing what i need to discuss as equals yes.

i think it is you you are talking about the extent to which progress is or not is being made or not being made to help the music we can afford to be or not for me it was a fascinating and wonderful moment this morning when i read my daily newspaper here in berlin it had a headline nigeria praises germany. well jerry a seems to believe that germany is getting something right here. fair enough nigeria should praise germany because something has been done but again that is the beginning and i have to say we owe we have to complicate the conversation a bit more nigeria prince in germany doesn't suffice you know we have to speak to some of the people to this. actually belong you know and that is why i want the 2 priests generally the you know the king the representative of the people of been

should priest and i know something is going on right i want the people on the street in been in despite the multiplicity of opinions to acknowledge to see that something is happening and for that to happen they have to be able to go back to the palace of the and see the been in bronze is there your thoughts on the issue of nigeria praising germany but perhaps you know as word why do we go next from you know praise is good promises have been made but what happens next. next even i must get myself really. ear we each i don't understand 8 but leave they now uriah praising. him money for doing their just think about. the divide. as far as i know nigeria was and

a british colony it was not on budget money in on r. and d. when they themselves because the objects which. by. the not by jim and jim us but from the british i mean now the even them bath of course in thinking that way they'd need a perris but me myself coming from a contrie which was colonized by jim ones i have must get to know not even a single object has been given back. for jim months anyway or so i praise it easiest. it is if i need to gives me now enough for room as face to say hey. you did. back to nigeria what about tanzania what about you nigeria what about kameron

what you told bill discounters aware totally and i jamen. there was a short period of german colonial rule but in terrible things happened let's just let's just rewind a little bit just there's nothing like a short period of call and you know this i'm calling it as it was calling out isn't the time you know i think we have to be very precise about this you know the violent it's a violent attack of absolutely ok just a week or so ago where we now know germany actually currently wants to say something but yeah yeah i am trying to make myself heard i just wanted to support and say i think that we need a multilateral european effort to it's not very useful to play one colonial regime against the other and use that as mutual excuses in the worst case so i think that in all these initiatives of coming together and speaking on equal terms it is important to bring in other colonial powers as well and the

methods may have been different but in the end it compounds itself to one colonial tea in the present and then of course the different european countries come. with different perspectives on their colonial past and i think ok germany can be a trendsetter and man some respects but france and britain and portugal etc also have their own ways of doing that with much larger diasporas from their former colonies which changes the terms of debate hugely important points you just be making because for some of our viewers i'd like to just go back to these the agreement that germany has apparently reached now with nigeria to return at least a share of clung to donte facts known as the bend in bronze is we don't know how many let's find out 1st of all though a little bit more about these works of art before talking about the damage done to africa by european colonialism. to this day bronze sculpture is still

produced in nigeria following accosting method that is over 7 centuries old and unique in africa and at the end of the 19th century the german empire purchased over 1000 of these strong statues from english colonialists the artworks were plundered by british forces during a raid on a city in present day nigeria but many german museums are proud of the stolen goods as these valuable exhibits are even listed as you know ask a world heritage. site decades african art experts and historians have been demanding baby birds and arguing that the bronze is a part of nigerian identity. and. you can look up the soul of a people these after the logical museums are like prisons and be good for you says that the german government has cleared the way for the return of the bronze is to many this has come as a surprise since the person that's in it what is happening is sensational and

that's worse than we might google it's a paradigm shift as a person suddenly returning precious objects to africa is no longer a problem a tall thin man. can this be germany's chance to redeem itself from its colonial crimes. that's a big question can this be germany's trance to redeem itself from its crimes or are you i walked i heard a very strong sentence in that report was these i thought well to call museums like prisons yes i do would prefer to be you know they are like prisons unfortunately but not only. of the souls of people but also of your histories and the knowledge of us you know in might serve you know the europeans to have these so-called objects in there but many of them. you know they have subjectivity and they were meant to be used and you know in

performances in rituals you know so taking this depriving people of this is really it's in some way killing them a slow killing a detailed to realize ition of the people so they don't even know that they lost their bearings you know and i think this is a very important thing so we need to freed them from this prisons. i'm surprised a little bit about the the mood of optimism at the moment especially among people sort of insiders especially in germany are saying this is a paradigm shift a big move forward but really we're talking about. a certain number of artifacts will be returned by 2020 to the earliest you know. that doesn't sound very fluffy these these figures that are being bandied around it doesn't sound like a real change is in the making to me. each sounds

it sounds somewhat hollow where really i don't understand. they just on any given bank they given the odds and if which is odd we don't know exactly how many of them where he did and so on and when these are heights where he didn't it is amusing that when you preserve because we have not been allowed to these presents 2 . of even i look at them. yes only those ones which i've been exhibited if they're just on live yet if you i don't know the ethanol logical museum here a 1000000000 there i don't i don't know 5 or something like bet i don't exactly them but very few act where i did so called 440

ok let's see we're let's 1st listen to occur to say she wants coming from mines again yes i'm just wanting to put in a few a few distinctions there the one is that i think the property rights for the objects need to be going back to the source communities and then the question is of course within the source communities they have to define of who is the rightful owner is that the central state is the federal state is that the king king's family or is it another community etc etc then those people have the right to determine whether they want some objects in the world to demonstrate the high quality of art of culture of rituals it cetera so that is a question of property rights the 2nd point is i think that the optimism right now is justified because the return of objects is part and the return of property rights is part of

a larger initiative to. bring in new in lover to the concept of museums that trans nationally operate that bring in artists to open up museums to a larger public and that make histories of a lot of suffering visible with objects or the absence of objects visible etc and. the good institute has been trying to also promote this in the sense of that african museums among themselves peer to peer learning is enhanced or supported and that their takes place again in exchange with european or german curators so i think when we think of this return as part of a larger process of thinking. new forms of work in and with museums then it makes sense and is justified. sometimes i feel that the question of property rights is really

a delay tactics in many of the cases we actually know what the owners are you know the kingdom of been in is represented by the beginning we could talk to the above been in directly you know door it is part of nigeria which is a construct as we know barely in a 100 something years old but the kingdom of been in existence for much longer and is still there we know where form is we know wedding gamba people and actually if we really wanted to speak to them we would speak to them you know i go back to the example of the that was sent back to cameroon in 1074 it went to the people of calm and it is there to can carry off properly and i think you know we have the impression it's a kind of a delay tactic as you know there. it's it's it's actually clear what on earth are here this is something current lip can be the case and i agree with mr deacon

that has often been done but i do think that the thing is that a museum in berlin or in mines or wherever cannot unilaterally decide to restore something to that because you have the national museums in the area for instance which also says that they have a word in this whole process so what i think brings the process forward now in nigeria is that they have the legacy restoration trust fund where all these nigerians are together in one group and tried to sort out this question of whether to bring them to the palace or whether to show them in the museum which is being constructed and i think the important message i take from you is that it's not up to the european actors to decide on a holiday sort of problem in nigeria tanzania and kenya thank you ok but i do think you have to accept that the germans cannot give cannot take a decision in saying that ok we don't care what the nigerian say the government

says we deal directly with the king family i don't think that would work ok talk about germany germany's ethnological museums are we have we know full of our crammed full of arts and culture from around the world and for a long time the interests of the countries of origin were simply dismissed let's just see some pictures 1st of all. can seal and denial and delay for decades this has been the strategy jamming museums have taken towards restitution claims from africa. the most striking example is well famous bust of an equity cheat queen of ancient egypt it was brought to belin illegally by german archaeologists. despite repeated demands for its return. the museum and politicians have refused to even negotiate. ethnological collections in germany count a total of 1500000 artifacts most of them from africa. missing persons

documentation of how they got here but most of the out what's been looted all stolen 95 percent of the collection gathering dust in archives without ever being exhibited so. what positive exception is the linda museum in stuttgart in 2019 inside back to switch chances this with the bible that once belongs to national hero chief hendrik quick point. maybe as president accepted the ossified in an emotional official ceremony. to african states have the right to demand that goldstone odds of facts are returned. that is the big question to the big question then we go back to history when their colonial empire.

they were dealing with communities where we had king said the king's wish to was as a lead as a contrary and you find this a call to traditionally does with 2 of them and you we do appreciate today i'm and if they have their food to talk to the central government and to do monday their property back a problem is in this country is they don't know whom they should you do my this object who here in. gemini and. complicated when it comes to the return of human remains we're trying to weasel specialist area an area that is very very important for you tell us a little bit about it we're short on time i'm sorry for that but i really want to hear about yes from here from the area for instance where come from kilimanjaro

area from kilimanjaro there kilimanjaro are 30 research council has already give a demand today jim on the government to return the whole day human remains the objects and when we're talking about district councils they do belong to the governmental level and the government of dunne's idea object that it is it supports so. we should for. the months just because i know people there and kilimanjaro and i'm from that same area that's why i say direct at least to this or to this why there isn't as central low here in jamun we. old a museum stage even as it is clear and it's. kind of low

to give back. ok it was just wanted to add that when we talk about a situation we don't talk only about dresses you know optics you talk about decision of dignity and that is a typical keys you know when the people get you know the skeletons by this is certain return of the to committee to have the possibility of burying people with on no return of. corona in mind for do i say one for one final point to sign off for us a next time well where are you guys here in berlin for another round the so much to say in cairo will have you here injure it was the use of your force. just keep up the optimism i think that talking to each other is the most important to the way forward entreating respectful and listening to each others' points of view brings us forward thank you very much is the word from the gentleman here in berlin to thank you very much for joining us karol alone sane minds it's i hope we're giving

you a lot of food for thought and as i say i'd like to continue the show a 2nd time around the restaurant invite these guys along another day thanks for joining us see you soon bye bye. cut cut. cut cut a. prompt

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