New York - The head of a Namibian tribe said on Tuesday he has
been excluded from a Berlin ceremony to return skulls of those
murdered in Namibia by Germany over a century ago.
Herero chief Vekuii Rukoro is involved in an attempt to bring a
class-action lawsuit against the German government for genocide
during Germany's colonial rule in what is now Namibia.
Rukoro said the German government is paying for a 25-member
delegation from Namibia to come to Berlin for the ceremony at the end
of August.
"My name has been excluded because I took the German government to
court," Rukoro, who has been the "Paramount Chief" of the Herero
since 2014, told dpa in New York. The German government has not
officially responded.
Some of the skulls of Herero and Nama people who were murdered during
colonial rule had been sent to German museums and will be handed over
to the visiting delegation.
The German protestant church will oversee the ceremony, according to
Bremen's Uebersee-Museum (overseas museum), which possesses two of
the skulls.
But their return must be carried out in accordance with relevant
religious rituals, Rukoro said, which must be performed by high
priests and "not by any Tom, Dick and Harry."
The church and Germany's foreign office did not confirm details of
the event to dpa.
Germany's rule of Namibia as the colony German South West Africa
lasted more than 30 years and ended in 1915 in the midst of World War
I.
It is unclear whether the New York court will take the case to trial.
The German government has said the case is inadmissible.