Kinshasa (AFP)
The President of the Democratic Republic of Congo Felix Tshisekedi thanked Belgium, former colonial power, for helping the Congo preserve its heritage, while pronouncing itself for an "organized" return of the works.
"It will be necessary that this heritage comes back, but it must be done in an organized manner," he told reporters Saturday at the official opening of the brand new national museum in Kinshasa which exhibits some 400 traditional objects.
"We must recognize that the Belgians have helped us to preserve it," he added, about the Congolese heritage taken to Belgium before independence in 1960 (masks, statues ...).
"This will be done in a concerted manner and then we will have to say a big thank you to Belgium who has kept our heritage," he added in a statement issued by the Presidency on Sunday.
Built by South Korea for $ 21 million, the National Museum of the Democratic Republic of Congo (MNRDC) is home to some 12,000 pieces in its brand new reserves.
Tens of thousands of others are kept in precarious conditions at the National Museums Institute (INM) in Mont-Ngaliema on the heights of Kinshasa.
In Belgium, the Congolese heritage is preserved in the Royal Museum of Central Africa (RMCA), of which 80% of the 120,000 ethnographic pieces come from Congo, according to experts.
A return of Congolese objects by Belgium took place in the 1970s at the request of dictator Mobutu Sese Seko. "At the time, not to lose face, the Belgians spoke of donation," says the statement of the Presidency.
In France, a report submitted to President Emmanuel Macron a year ago pleads for a "rapid restitution".
His co-author, the Senegalese economist Felwine Sarr, claims to be the target of a "lobby" of the opposing party: "We are told that there would be no museums in Africa or skills, that heritage would be in danger ".
© 2019 AFP