Talk with Descendants

For decades, families from Tanzania have been demanding the restitution of the remains of their ancestors: executed leaders of the resistance against the colonial power in so-called German East Africa. Around 1900, thousands of ancestors were sent from the colonies to Berlin, among other places, for racist research, and cultural, spiritual and everyday belongings were appropriated at the request of ethnological museums. As part of the MAREJESHO research exhibition, some of the missing leaders were identified for the first time through DNA comparison: Among them Mangi Molelia of Kibosho, his brother and another relative. They were hanged on 2 March 1900 in Old Moshi on the orders of German colonial officers. The ancestors are currently held by the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation (SPK) in Berlin. Additionally, personal belongings of the royal family of Kibosho are kept in the depots of the Ethnological Museum Berlin and the Linden Museum Stuttgart.

Two members of the Molelia family are travelling to Germany to pay their respects to their ancestors and view their belongings.

In a public talk in English and Swahili (translation), Sirili and Tony Molelia Mushi speak about their search and the urgency of bringing the ancestors and their belongings home to Kibosho, Kilimanjaro.

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