In a compelling essay for ART AFRICA, writer Ayo Akinwande revisits the long-running debate surrounding the restitution of Benin artefacts and the evolution of what was once envisioned as the Benin Royal Museum into the Museum of West African Art (MOWAA). At the heart of the essay is a forceful defense of Oba Ewuare II’s insistence on traditional custodianship and a critical interrogation of how a project meant to address historical injustice may be reproducing new forms of dispossession.
Akinwande argues that the Benin Bronzes cannot be understood as neutral or merely aesthetic objects. Rather, they are living ancestral beings, embedded within the spiritual, political, and historical life of the Benin Kingdom. Their legitimacy, the essay stresses, derives not from international museum standards or donor frameworks, but from their relationship to the Benin Palace, which has served as their rightful custodian for centuries.
According to the article, the gradual sidelining of royal authority in favour of donor-driven governance structures marked a turning point. What began as a restitution effort grounded in Benin tradition and sovereignty was transformed into MOWAA, a project increasingly shaped by external institutional priorities. This shift, Akinwande contends, fractured trust, provoked resistance, and undermined the moral foundation of restitution itself.
Within this context, the Oba’s opposition to MOWAA is reframed not as obstruction or inflexibility, but as a principled stand. Akinwande presents the Oba’s position as a defence of spiritual ownership, historical continuity, and the civilizational dignity of Benin. Far from rejecting restitution, the Palace’s stance insists that restitution without custodial consent is incomplete—and potentially harmful.
As the essay poignantly concludes, “a restitution museum without the consent of the rightful custodians risks becoming another act of dispossession.” In this light, Akinwande challenges readers to reconsider who restitution is truly for, and whether justice can be achieved when authority is displaced from those to whom history, culture, and spirituality assign it.
— Adapted from an essay by Ayo Akinwande, originally published in ART AFRICA.
