The Jesus College at Cambridge University, London, has handed over to Nigeria the Okukor, a sculpture that was looted by British troops in 1897, setting a precedent expected to put pressure on other institutions to return stolen artefacts.
The handing over documents were signed on Wednesday during a ceremony at the college to transfer ownership of the Okukor to the Nigerian delegation.
London-based Daily Mail reported that the sculpture of a cockerel was one of hundreds of Benin Bronzes pillaged from the Kingdom of Benin, in Nigeria.
The college’s Legacy of Slavery Working Party concluded in 2019 that the cockerel “belongs with the current Oba at the Court of Benin”.
Shedding more light on the development in a brief telephone interview with THISDAY Wednesday night, Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, said the campaign to return the stolen artefacts commenced in 2018. Mohammed said he had travelled to London to engage the Secretary of Arts and Culture over the Ife Bronze, which was stolen from the museum in Jos and was thereafter sold to an art collector in Belgium.
According to the minister, “The art collector in Belgium now sent it to an auctioneer to value it for sale. But because we had reported the case to the International Organisation of Museum (IOM), Interpol, and all authorities, it was intercepted and the British government held it.
“So, we asked them to return it to us. I had to travel to London to push for its return. The auctioneer then said we must pay for it and we refused. Then we also pursued the cockerel, which is the one that they are returning now.
