Benin Bronzes: I am talking to Michael Day - “Chief Foreign Commentator for the i Newspaper”

Ipemndoh dan Iyan 

European powers used museum galleries to justify their conquests and grotesque violence in Africa and elsewhere [and] to promote the message of cultural superiority© Professor Dan Hicks PhD – https://inews.co.uk/news/world/benin-bronzes-british-museum-culture-wars-george-osborne-chair-nigeria-history-1116173 

Preamble 

Let us get two minor but equally grave – the Paradox – Mentions in your Article corrected. One; General Yakubu Gowon was never a President of Nigeria. He did not at any time describe himself as such. Give the Man his due Respect. He recognized himself as “Head of State.“ As young as he was then, he knew what was, and what was not. He later proved the Extent of his Intellect with an Academic Doctorate – the Doctor of Philosophy Degree (DPhil/PhD). General Mohammed Murtala who overthrew his Government also did not address himself as "President." General Olusegun Obasanjo who took over from him after his Assassination following a botched Coup Attempt also did not call himself "President." Obasanjo later became a 2-Term elected Civilian President. He too has proven his cognitive Mettle with a PhD. I do not know how Major General Muhammadu Buhari - the current Civilian President - referred to himself when he usurped the elected Government of President Shehu Shagari. I was no longer in Nigeria at the time. 

Notwithstanding my Absence from Nigeria, I know for certain that General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida who toppled Buhari called himself “President.” I became aware of Babangida from when he was a Colonel, I think. He used to be written about as Ibrahim Gbadamosi Babaginda, if I recall correctly. While Ibrahim is an Arabic Name - not necessarily Muslim, but an Arabic Name mistaken for a Muslim Name as all Arabic Nemes - Gbadamosi and Babaginda are Names suggesting a Yoruba Lineage. Babangida has, in fact, been said to have come from Ogbomosho in Yoruba Oyo State. It is the birthplace of the assassinated Western Region Premier Samuel Ladoke Akintola.1 I would not, however, assert that I know of Babangida’s true Identity. He talks like a bona fide Hausa Person which would suggest that even if he is from Yoruba Stock, he would either had been born in Hausaland or got there at a very young Age. If then he claims to be Hausa, why should he not? 

Two; your “Chika Okeke-Agulu, a professor of African and Africa Diaspora Art at Princeton University,” did not explain how the Benin Bronzes “are tainted by the blood of Biafra”. You did not push him on that, but allowed him to use you wittingly, as a Biafran Propagandum Vessel. How many Benin Bronzes did Gowon gift Queen Elizabeth – just 1 – that you can now equate it in Relevance to the many Thousands looted by British Colonialism? “Chika Okeke-Agulu”, are suspiciously Igbo Names, and the Man apparently would prefer to be identified as ‘Biafran’. The Benin People are not Igbo. Their Origin is Yoruba. Okay, I admit that there is a genealogical Connection between the Igbo and the Yoruba,2 but would you today call an Igbo Person a Yoruba, and vice versa? They are Kin. That is all.

How right is Professor Hicks' Commentary in the Indent above?

If Professor Hicks had used the Word 'celebrate' instead of "justify" in his Commentary that “European powers used museum galleries to justify their conquests and grotesque violence in Africa and elsewhere [and] promote the message of cultural superiority” I would say that he is partially-correct. His Proposition would have half-captured the original Intention of the raiding and transfer of African Artefacts to the Western World. If you could subdue them you are superior. Whether that particular Superiority is Evidence of Fungibility is another Question. I am unable to reconcile with Dr Hicks, however, on how Artefacts in European Museums from colonized Territories "promote the [European] message of cultural superiority.” Non-European Artefacts are not pitted against European Artefacts in European/Western Museums. Rather, they are showcased as Evidence of Conquest. This is why I wrote that if Professor Hicks had said 'celebrate' instead of "justify" in his Commentary I would have agreed halfway with him. 'Justify' is pre-action, normally to excuse what is to come, not after-action Demonstration, i.e., as expressed here by Professor Hicks. Was he saying that the Justification is in bringing the Artefacts to Europe? Justification of or for what? The View that the display of raided non-European/Western Artefacts in Western Museums emphasize 'white' Folks' "cultural superiority" was founded on Miscomprehension. Interestingly today, the Presence of African Arts in Western Museums is Celebration of African Culture. The ordinary Westerner now has the Opportunity to be acquainted with African Arts if s/he wants to without going through the Expense of traveling to Africa to enjoy them. 

Let Bronzes remain where they are

Except for the History of the Transportation of African Arts to ‘white’ Folk Countries, I would say leave the Benin Bronzes where they are in Western Museums and Institutions of higher Learning. If the Histories of how African Artefacts got to be in European Custody are told as the British Museum narrates them or has had Professor George Boyne of the University of Aberdeen,3 I believe Africans have nothing to fear that the Truth (or near-Truths) of the Journeys of those Items are being rendered. There is a Way that African Countries can benefit from this financially in addition to the cultural-familiarity already accruing. Allow these Artefacts to stay as Loan Items, and make those housing them pay Fees for the Privilege. This is evidently a ‘Win, win’. 

Returning African Arts to African Countries is ‘zero-sum’ whichever Way you look at it, both for the current Hosts, and the African Countries they are being returned to. Take again, for instance, the Benin Bronzes. Already, there is no Consensus on what should happen with them once they get back to ‘Nigeria’. Should the Oba (King) of Benin, Ewuare II, become their Custodian, retrieving them into his Palace? The Bronzes are his and all succeeding Benin Obas' in the Tradition of Inheritance. After all, they say the Obas of Benin tasked the Artefacts to be made, and would have paid the Artisans. Thus, the Benin Bronzes are private Properties. If not for Colonialism stealing them and spiriting them away they would still be with the Palace of Benin in Entirety, and in perpetuity. I wish I could propose the Alternative; that Oba Ewuare II has no right to them, that those Bronzes belong to the Benin People, and by Extension to ‘the People’ of Edo State, and widely to ‘the People’ of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. If I argue this, I would be lying to you because I would have lied to myself. Such Sophistry occurred to me initially but being me, I just do not take the first Idea and run with it. I think. I reflect. I deliberate around the inalienable Principle of ‘Fairness’. If I could not believe what I write, and I also know that normative Logic could not come in Aid anyway, I do not commence on any Misdirection of Thought or dishonest opinionating. However, if the Obas of Benin did not pay the Artisans for the Transactions of fashioning the Benin Bronzes then what I say would be a false Proposition would indeed be quite a sound Argument. These most memorable Bronzes would belong primarily to the Benin People of which the Palace is a Part then to the Yoruba People from whom the Benin People emerged then to Edo State where the Benin People are today located, and finally to 'the People' of Nigeria with whom the Benin People share the same Territorial-State.

In the normal Sense, keeping the Bronzes in the Palace of the Oba of Benin would be excluding the World from delighting in them. How would we have sight of them? Would we not now need to attend the Palace to view them, perhaps pay to do so? Importantly, would we not be subjected to Palace Rituals in the Process? I, for Example, would want to view them without enduring the Palace Process.4 I am not, in the least, interested in the Deification of the African Monarch into a god. Where was his Godness – not Godliness – when the ordinary European overran his Kingdom and carted away his Treasures and/or dethroned him and/or massacred his People and/or laid his Land to waste? Where was this Godness when the mere Human Being ‘white’ Folk rather sat on his Land, and colonized his People for Centuries. Bah, it is a Belief System not tenable in today’s World of Enlightenment. Perhaps, the unpossessing ‘white’ Folk is a greater god than he?

Should Edo State manage the Benin Bronzes on behalf of the Palace of Benin or should it be the Federal Republic of Nigeria? Well, were the Federal Republic of Nigeria to take Charge of these Bronzes, where would they be located, in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, that has no cultural Connection to the Bronzes, or would Lagos be the Candidate? I think not. The Bronzes should be sited in Edo State. In fact, they must be situated in the City of Benin. The cultural Value of the Bronzes must be appreciated within the Geography of their Creation, the People, the Land, the Environment. If the Federal Republic of Nigeria wishes to contribute to the funding or totally fund the Project of accommodating these Bronzes upon return to Nigeria, it is jolly well welcomed. However, both Edo State, and the Federal Republic of Nigeria need the Agreement of the Oba of Benin, ergo, the Palace of Benin, to take up the Management of the Benin Bronzes. I still maintain though that the Bronzes ought to remain where they are right now in ‘white’ Folks Countries. 

The African and African Arts

The African Relationship with the Arts is seamless to the Point that a non-African would see that Relationship as One of Indifference. The African is born with the Arts surrounding the Birth, as Poetry as the Child comes forth into the World. The Arts envelopes the Child everyday in the familial Praises by its Mother at every Opportunity she gets. The Child grows up with Art Figurines and Artefacts around him or her even as casually thrown away in the Bushes. I am African, and our yearly Masquerade Festivals are exquisite Demonstrations of different Art Forms. As an Adult, the African does not think of any of these Things as special. To her or him, they are common, not because s/he disrespects them. No, s/he is familiar with them such that s/he does not really know their Value in cultural Terms. It is against this Background that I appraised the Nigerian Journalist who ridiculed the semi-Conversion of the Museum at Onikan, Lagos into a Museum and a Cafe. I came across the Article in July this Year 2021 written in that Month. His Criticism was in passing in an Article that covered many Issues. I lived in Nigeria in the 1970s when this Conversion occurred. I was at the Museum everyday during Lunchtime to eat Suya,5 and drink Palm Wine while at the same time delighting in the Artworks galleried in the Museum. You see, I understood but our pseudo-intellectual Critic did not. The Museum was bringing ‘the People' to the Arts, and fostering a different Appreciation of them.

Some Africans depart slightly from this normative of seeming Indifference to African Arts to either see Art in everything (or almost everything) or try to become wannabe Western Occidentals (‘white’) and ignore our Arts in mistaken Comprehension of how Occidentals perceive African Arts. I am of the former. I have been among cultured ‘white’ Folks and I know they hold African Arts in great Esteem not because they say they do but by the Fact that they really do mean it when they say it. 

Endnotes

1Mr Akintola was summarily executed during the January 1966 Military Coup masterminded and carried out by mainly Igbo Military Officers. 

2Adeyemo, A. A. et al; 'Genetic structure in four West African population groups', BMC Genetics 2005, 6:38 – http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2156/6/38. 

3He is the “Principal and Vice Chancellor” of the University of Aberdeen. 

4I have actually seen them. I have talked in the first Person to generalize the Difficulty of the Bronzes on Palace Grounds.

5'Suya' is a Nigerian Delicacy of smoked beef prepared by Hausa Cooks. The Hausa are from northern Nigeria, and are often but mistakenly described as "Hausa-Fulani." The Fulani, and the Hausa are distinct Groups albeit you will find mixed Identities. These Groups are also not isolated to 'Nigeria'. European Colonialism in Competition partitioned the same African Peoples into separate European Enclaves which are today different Territorial-States.  'Suya' is not strictly a 'Nigerian' Delicacy as most Nigerians might not be aware. I have come across it in Ghana prepared by Ghanaians, and Senegal cooked by Senegalese but I was no longer eating red Meat at the time so I could not try them. When I visited Nigeria in 2005, I tried the Chicken Version but nay. Of course, Nigerians introduced 'Suya' into London too. Jollof Rice too is not solely Nigerian. In fact, it originated in Senegambia from where it took the Name 'Jollof' from 'Jolof', I think. I have eaten Senegalese Jollof Rice.

Ipemndoh dan Iyan PhM©

AsimauGlobalMedia© 

All Rights 2021©

24 July