Gary Younge
NIGERIAN art treasures are being looted from museums to supply an underground network of dealers, most of them based in London and New York. The multi-million pound trade, which contravenes a United Nations convention on the sale and smuggling of stolen artwork, has left some museums in the country virtually empty.
The looting sparked calls in Britain for the new Labour government to honour its manifesto commitment to rejoin Unesco, which supports the return of all stolen artefacts.
Officially, more than 230 works have been stolen from Nigerian museums, but it is generally accepted that the real figure is much higher. Missing works include Benin bronzes, terracotta heads from Ife in the south, and Sokoto and Nok heads from the north-west.
Many predate written history in their areas and provide some of the few remaining clues to civilisations which flourished up to 2 000 years ago.
In the museum at the University of Ife, thieves, who are often armed, have looted practically the entire collection leaving only empty display cases and a bemused curator.
“When the last set of robbers came the museum guards were drugged. Someone came and promised them a meal and of course they were hungry. While they slept the museum was robbed of most of its last works,” said the museum’s archaeologist, Ope Onabajo.
Last month, several officials at the national museum of antiquities were arrested for trying to sell exhibits to an American dealer. One official said: “We do arrange for things like that at times. What does it depend on? Money of course.”
Nigeria’s isolation from the international community following the execution of the human rights activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa, has compounded difficulties in retrieving the exhibits.
The works are usually taken from the provinces to the capital, Lagos, where they are boxed up before being smuggled overseas.
Photographs are sent ahead to dealers so they can find out what is on the market, then if they are interested the piece usually follows.