Benin restores slavery monuments to testify to brutal past

Benin holds its annual voodoo festival -- an event that lures an influx of visitors to the capital Porto-Novo and underscores voodoo's comeback in the country of its birth. Voodoo, more often called "vodun" in West Africa, has a hierarchy of deities and tribal spirits of nature and sees revered ancestors living alongside the living.

Lawmaker cries out as kidnappers allegedly kill 21 on Lokoja-Benin road.

Police arrest three suspects in Benin over alleged kidnap, murder

DR Congo and Madagascar mark six decades of independence from former colonial powers. The legacy of the damaging years of European colonialism continues to weigh heavily on the development of the African nations. Also, Benin commemorates those in its history who passed through its cities as they were sold into slavery. And Somalia celebrates its 60th year of independence from Italy by reopening long-closed cultural sites like its national theatre in Mogadishu.

As Western cities see statues of slaveholders and colonialists toppled, Benin's coastal town of Ouidah is going the other way, by restoring monuments from the slave trade era. During the 17th and 18th centuries, European slavers held more than one million African men, women and children in Ouidah's Portuguese Fort before shipping them across the Atlantic in abominable conditions.

Oba of Benin, Omo N’Oba N’Edo Uku Akpolokpolo, Oba Ewuare II met with political parties and leaders where he urged them to embrace peace ahead of the Edo governorship election.

The Edo State Government imposed a 24-hour curfew across the state until further notice. The decision was taken after incidents of vandalism and attacks carried out by hoodlums who high jacked the #EndSARS protest.

Benin fire: Section of Oregbeni market road, goods worth millions of Naira destroyed

On a small island surrounded by hundreds of wooden huts on stilts, in the middle of Lake Nokoue in southeast Benin, a giant painting is taking shape. French artist 'Saype' is busy transforming a playground in the floating village of Ganvie, the latest site in his "Beyond Walls" project, featuring interlaced hands.

Germany's Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation will oversee the return of the statues to Nigeria, but it's going to be a complicated process.

More than five centuries after his reign, Oba Ewuare’s legacy is still alive in Benin City. He is remembered for his mystical powers, promoting arts and the bronze figures that have stood the test of time.

Here are a few reasons to pick up a copy of The Guardian on Wednesday. Find these stories and much more when you grab a copy of The Guardian on Wednesday.⁣ ⁣