While we may engage in Controversy Over Possession of Benin Looted Bronzes – The Tide, 23/7/2021 (Page 16), serious thought should be given to the origins and symbolisms of artifacts. There had been negotiations between the Federal Government of Nigeria and Germany to return 1,130 Benin artifacts said to have been looted from Nigeria a long time ago. Relevant issues here are not the rolling out of musical drums to celebrate the return of the artifacts or who would take custody of them, but the history behind them.
One Professor Holmes in a lecture delivered at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London decades ago, said: “If I have to choose between Arts and Science, I would choose Arts…” He went on to say that all genuine works of art connect the present with primordial past, such that life as a continuum can be appreciated better. Therefore, what we call artifacts are lasting works of art which out-live their creators and convey messages of remote pasts.
Dr Washington Osa Osifo was right when he wrote that “We speak to the artifacts and they speak to us in mutually decodable idioms”. What is known as anamnesis in serious studies is the recall of memories of past eras and incarnations, which can be made possible by contacts with specific artifacts. There was one such artifact whose root was ancient Peru, thousands of years ago, which someone bought for millions of pounds sterling because of the memories which it rekindled in the buyer. Like deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) artifacts reveal the past.
The invasion and fall of old Benin Empire began in 1897, first with an expedition undertaken by the Niger Coast Protectorate. Then Acting Consul-General Phillips set out to negotiate with the Oba. Issues to negotiate included trade agreement and abolition of human sacrifices. Phillips’ visit to Benin coincided with Oba Ovenramwen’s celebration of a great Ague Festival when no strangers would be allowed into the empire.
Sadly Phillips, five other Englishmen and some Africans with the party were killed. Then followed a punitive expedition of 1,500 troops to bring down Benin, coupled with looting of great treasures which included works of art in the empire. It is better to loot and preserve great works of art than to burn and destroy such relics which invading troops often do. Cases of looting, plundering and destruction of human lives and valued property did not take place in Benin Empire alone but also in several places by colonial invaders.
Great and genuine works of art do not only depict glorious deeds of the past, but also deeds of ignominy and vaulting ambitions, such that ‘we are mock’d with art”. Not only in Shakespeare’s Winter’s Tale is erring humanity mocked via works of art, but also in Shelley’s Ozymandias of Egypt: “My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” That was a message of irony stamped on lifeless legs of stone standing in a desert. Work of sculpture!
William Blake (1757-1827), a British poet and engraver, would remind us that what we see visibly can be a mirror image of what we cannot see visibly.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, told Nigerians that the federal government would not limit the battle to repatriate looted artifacts to the Benin one only. There are also Ife bronzes and Terracotta, Nok and Owo Terracotta, the arts of Benin Rivers Valley, the Ukwu, the arts of Bida, Igala, Jukun and several others. There are rare works of art dating thousands of years ago, originating from various African communities. Yet, a British professor could assert that Africa had no history!
Any Nigerian who has had the opportunity to visit the British museum in London would have a glimpse of the extent of injustices and distortions which racial prejudices have brought about. It would not be difficult to agree with writers who suggested that our enslavers and colonizers underdeveloped Africa. Neither would it be wrong to say that religion was the second tool that facilitated the project. The first tool was the machine gun. A local African chief was quoted as saying: “Who would argue with groups of strangers invading your community with the kind of guns which you do not have?” Slavers and colonizers usually carry guns.
When late M.K.O. Abiola tried to spearhead the issue of reparation to Africa from European colonizing powers because of the harms and lootings suffered by Africans, there was a gang-up against him. There were more intrigues and issues than what we know, regarding the fate of late Abiola and his ambition to be President of Nigeria. So, the old colonial culture, mindset and credo remain a living philosophy – exploitation!
During the 10-year war which Haiti had with France, in the struggle for political independence, the true face of the culture and philosophy of colonialism came to light. Runaway slaves began to settle in Hispaniola in territories hardly accessible, but which rugged Black slaves took as homes, between 1760-1802. The war of independence was quite bloody, with the combined efforts of France and America causing great obstacles to the dream of “Freedom and Justice”. It was ironical that races that preached freedom and justice would seek to destroy such ideals.
Now the culture of colonizing and preying upon the weak by the strong through territorial conquests takes a different guise. Therefore, one true fact about human history is that man is a predator, of which colonial exploits and internal domination are manifestations of that propensity. Artifacts as relics of human activities and mindset, tell the stories of human intrigues and propensities. Then the fictions: religions, wars and weapons of mass destruction serve as camouflage which facilitate the predatory propensities.
The old story about revolutionary struggles against exploitation, the longing for freedom and justice, formed the fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist philosophy. It is a story about a divided human species: the oppressors or predators and the oppressed or working class. It is a perennial struggle to bring about an equilibrium which can never be brought about, except in El-Dorado! Human hypocrisies portrayed in artifacts!

Dr Amirize is a retired lecturer from the Rivers State University, Port Harcourt.