Sweden to return 40 Benin artefacts

The Swedish Government is set to return 40 artefacts looted from the Benin Kingdom during the 1897 Benin massacre.

Top delegation from the Benin Palace led by Secretary to the Benin Traditional Council, Frank Irabor, are expected to receive the items in Lagos State on Thursday.

The Benin Monarch, Oba Ewuare II, diaclosed this when he received Chairman and Chief Executive of National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (rtd.).

Oba Ewuare II said return of the artefacts were results of many years of negotiations and struggle.

He said prayers to God and his ancestors stopped plans to re-loot the artefacts.

Oba Ewuare II recalled how he first discussed issues about the artefacts with the King of Sweden when he served as Nigeria's Ambassador to the Scandinavian countries.

He said he vowed the returned artefacts would not be re-looted while he sat on the Benin throne.

According to him: "We believe in prayers a lot. We have our ways of praying. We are neither Muslim nor Christians or whatever Christians. We are traditionalists and we interact a lot, even with the Pope in the Vatican. We have gathered a lot of experiences on how we do things that take people by surprise that is almost like magic. It was by the power of our ancestors and God we handled those prospective re-looters of our artifacts.

"We have been trying from my grandfather's effort to bring back our artifacts. My grandfather succeeded, my father succeeded more and I think now history is obvious to everybody. We are doing our best to triple and triple all that efforts of our forefathers. We now see the return of our artifacts stream in.

"What you have now is the result of the effort we made many years back. As they say better late than never. More artifacts are coming from that Sweden that I said. That Sweden, which I served as a result of our effort many years back. They saw a lot of people, countries responding positively."