France's Words, and France's Actions on African Cultural Property Restitution

In 2017, with much fanfare, at the dawn of his first term, French President Emmanuel Macron made a commitment to restitution of African heritage from France within 5 years. That was five years ago. In that time only a few works have returned, with 90,000 still held by French public museums. What happened? (see Feiza Ben Mohamed, '5 years on, where are the objects looted from Africa that France's president promised to return?' Anadolu Agency 18.11.2022)

To assess the situation, in 2018 Macron appointed two experts to study and deliver their recommendations on restitution of the African works. They are Benedicte Savoy, art historian and member of the College of France, and Felwine Sarr, a Senegalese writer and academic, who were appointed to examine the conditions under which the works could be repatriated and protected in the countries they belong to. But five years later, it seems that the restitution process, which requires a legislative basis, remains very complex, so that only a few works have been returned to their African homes. To date, no fewer than 90,000 objects belonging to Africa are still held by French public museums, according to a study by French daily Le Monde.

 

Germany Hands Over Some Looted Artefacts To Namibia

Germany Hands Over Looted Artefacts To Namibia, But On loan (Channels Television May 30, 2022).

Namibia on Monday took delivery of 23 ancient pieces of jewellery, tools and other objects pillaged during colonial rule, and returned as an indefinite loan from Germany. The return of the artefacts is part of a project to encourage rapprochement between the two nations. “All the artefacts were collected during the Germany colonial era from different Namibian communities,” said the Museum Association of Namibia chairwoman, Hilma Kautondokwa. The returned items were taken mostly between the 1860s and the early 1890s, she said. Hundreds of other objects remain in Germany.

The items were handed over to the National Museum of Namibia by the Germany’s Ethnological Museum of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation. The return came after three years of talks The previous year, Germany repatriated skulls, bones and human remains that had been shipped to Berlin during the period for “scientific” experiments.