a huge new museum housing thousands of
artifacts from africa
asia and oceania is opening here in
berlin today
it has been years in the making but its
inauguration is being overshadowed
by an increasingly heated debate on
looted art
that's because among the items said to
be displayed at the museum known as the
humboldt forum
are the benin bronzes they are
sculptures and metal plaques stolen from
the
by the british in 1897 from the kingdom
of benin
in what is now a door state in southern
nigeria
and sold to a number of western
countries
they're viewed as some of africa's
greatest treasures and calls are growing
for the german government
to return them we want our trash return
of those things
here they belong here this way they were
made and we know
the purpose the reason why we made them
another person demanding the return of
the benin bronzes is nigeria's
ambassador to germany his excellency
yusuf tugar sent a letter to the german
government
making the demand he joins me now to
talk about this welcome to dw news
africa ambassador
why do you feel so strongly about the
return of these sculptures
why is it so important to get them back
to nigeria
it's a continuation of nigeria's
position since independence nigeria has
been
consistently calling for the return
of uh looted stolen
cultural properties uh which include the
benin bronzes
the ife bronzes
artworks as well as the noc terracotta
right i'm merely um continuing that
advocacy
right um ambassadors these sculptures
um they're considered sacred to people
uh in nigeria
just how does it feel knowing that if
these people who revere these
uh for what they are want to see them
they've got to travel all the way to
europe
truth of the matter is majority of the
people
cannot see them 200 million nigerians
out of them probably just a handful of
people
have the ability to view
such cultural properties and we have a
very youthful
population i feel that it would
go a long way towards um assisting
nigerian youths to understand our
history our culture
particularly in a situation where we are
uh
we were projected to be bereft of
history before contact with the
enlightened
outsiders ambassador the truth is i mean
you
you've said it yourself that this is
something you've been calling for since
independence
it's been about a year since you wrote
that letter to the german government
how do you feel about the response that
nigeria has been getting do you feel
like others do hear
that the germans are dragging their feet
about this
well the fact of the matter is we have
not received a response yet
a year later um and what do you make of
that
well it's it's quite strange quite
peculiar because
uh as you know embassies
represent countries in other states in
other countries
and um official communication
emanates from the embassy within
the country being communicated to so um
we would have at least expected some
sort of response
ambassador yes you haven't been given a
response ambassador you you've taken the
issue to twitter
going public about what is normally done
through private uh diplomatic channels
i just wonder if if you're confident or
perhaps how confident you are
that you're going to be successful in
your push to get these artifacts back
well you see it's an idea whose time is
right you know this agitation
um is all over the world and it's tied
directly to colonial legacy
and particularly in germany
uh the home of the you know infamous
berlin conference in 1885
you have to remember that the sacking
of benin the benin
happened 12 years after the berlin
conference
right 1897. so it's directly linked to
that
and to display such stolen artworks such
stone and cultural properties
in berlin where the conference took
place is uh
it's you know it's it gives the feeling
of uh
sort of in your face for lack of a
better phrase
all right that's nigeria's ambassador to
germany his excellency yusuf tuga thank
you sir
thank you