BBC News Online: Entertainment: Arts

Nigeria demands treasures back

Many works were acquired when Britain was an imperial power

The country's lower house of parliament has called on its president, Olusegun Obasanjo, to request the repatriation of the artifacts, taken away during British colonial rule in the 19th Century.

Many of the works at issue are from Benin, a kingdom taken over by the British in 1897.

Other Nigerian artefacts have found their way to European museums through the connivance of corrupt officials, who helped collectors smuggle them out of the country.

Unanimous

Wednesday's motion urged the government to safeguard Nigerian museums from being "burgled" by hired agents.

It also ordered the Nigerian National Commission for Museums and Monuments to provide a list of all Nigerian artefacts at the British Museum - and list their value.

The motion, sponsored by 57 legislators, was passed unanimously.

Time magazine reported Omotoso Eluyemi, head of Nigeria's National Commission for Museums and Monuments, as saying: "These objects of art are the relics of our history - why must we lose them to Europe?"

"If you go to the British Museum, half the things there are from Africa. It should be called the Museum of Africa."

Recently, British Museum director Robert Anderson refused renewed calls for the "Elgin marbles" from the Parthenon to be returned to Greece.

Writing in The Times, Mr Anderson called the Parthenon sculptures "one of the greatest treasures of the British Museum".