Mozambique demands return of looted artefacts

Maputo, 26 May (AIM) – The Mozambican authorities are demanding the return of at least 800 artefacts looted during the colonial period.

Mozambique is thus part of a continental movement requiring that stolen African material and cultural property should be returned. There are believed to be around 3,000 of these looted artefacts.

“Historical reparations can also be done in a symbolic and cultural way, and hence we are organising ourselves to debate how we can appropriate what was stolen from our country, and from the African continent”, said Education Minister Samaria Tovele in Maputo on Sunday, during a celebration of Africa Day.

She stressed the need for the union of all Africans in building and aligning policies that can promote and guarantee reparations for colonised African peoples.

“Today we are free, but we need to recover all that was stolen from the African continent”, said Tovele. “That’s why the theme chosen for the celebrations of Africa Day is ‘Justice for Africans and for persons of African descent through reparations’”.

According to Foreign Minister Maria Lucas, the question of reparations also involves reparations for the deportations, massacres, arbitrary detentions, torture and looting of natural resources with catastrophic human and environmental impacts during colonialism.

But, given the complex and sensitive nature of the theme of reparations, it could not be implemented just in 2025, she said.

So a decade of reparations for the damage done by slavery in Africa is envisaged, Lucas added. The history of slavery was well documented, and so were the places from which Africans were dragged to distant lands, never to return.

“We have the Maputo fortress which was used as a transit point for many thousands of Mozambicans, transported under the most degrading conditions, that were an assault upon human dignity – which is why many never arrived at their destination, since they perished on the high seas”, said Lucas.

She added that the 2025 commemorations will culminate in an extraordinary summit of the African Union, with the participation of some heads of state and government from the Caribbean.
(AIM)
Nl/pf (347)