France has officially returned the Djidji Ayokwe sacred “talking drum” to the Ivory Coast, over a century after it was looted by French colonial troops.
The drum was seized by colonial authorities in 1916 before being taken to France in 1929, where it was put on display at the Trocadéro Museum and later at the Quai Branly Museum in Paris.
The Djidji Ayôkwé (Panther Lion), as the talking drum is called, was welcomed home by members of the Ebrié community, its original owners. It is more than three metres (10 ft) long, weighs about 430kg (68 stone), and is carved from Iroko wood.
According to the BBC, the return is part of a wider French effort to repatriate African cultural artefacts, a process that began in 2017.
BBC also reports that the drum was used by the Ebrie tribe to transmit messages and is considered a sacred piece of their culture. It was handed over on February 20, 2026, after France’s parliament approved its removal from national museum collections.
The returned drum arrived aboard a specially chartered plane but was not removed from its large wooden crate marked “fragile”.
”This is a historic day with a lot of emotions,” Ivory Coast’s Culture Minister Françoise Remarck told the BBC.
“We are living through a moment of justice and remembrance that finally marks the return of the Djidji Ayôkwé to its land of origin.”
Francis Tagro, director of the Museum of Civilisations in Abidjan, said the drum would be exhibited “in a place of honour in the heart of the national museum”.
“We are deeply happy and proud to receive this sacred drum. It means so much to us; it will elevate the sense of culture of the young generation,” he said.
The Ebrié people’s sacred talking drum, used for warnings, war mobilisation, and ceremony summons, was returned by Paris on Feb 20, following a special French law allowing its restitution, citing that it’s a key part of their heritage, based in Abidjan, the Ivory Coast’s biggest city.
BBC further reports that the talking drum is the first object on a list of 148 works that the Ivory Coast is seeking to have returned from France and other countries.
Also, France has already returned some of the Abomey royal treasures to Benin and a historic sabre to Senegal.
As restitution requests from former colonies increased, France’s Senate adopted a framework law on 29 January aimed at making it easier to remove colonial-era artefacts from French national collections, with the bill expected to be discussed shortly by the National Assembly.