A Nigerian commission has called for the cancellation of an auction of sacred Nigerian statues in Paris, alleging the artifacts were stolen. Christie’s auction house has defended the sale, saying the artworks were legitimately acquired and the auction will go ahead. In recent years, French courts have ruled in favour of auction houses whose sales of sacred objects, such as Hopi tribal masks, were contested by rights groups and representatives of the tribes. A Princeton scholar, Professor Chika Okeke-Agulu, alongside Nigeria’s National Commission for Museums and Monuments, raised the alarm earlier this month that the objects were looted during the Biafran war in the late 1960s. Christie’s wrote earlier this month to the Nigerian commission, saying the sale would go ahead. Okeke-Agulu, who is a member of the Igbo tribe, said the objects were taken through “an act of violence” from his home state of Anambra and that they should not be sold. An online petition with more than 2,000 signatures is demanding that the auction be halted.
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA