Until today, human remains of victims of Colonialism are part of the collection of the anatomic institute of University of Cologne. They are impiously exhibited in glass cases in a (semi-) public context. This exhibition practice violates day to day, even after their death, the dignity of the people whose remains are exhibited at University of Cologne. Descendants of those people claim provenience research and restitution of the remains. Until today, there are no visible efforts of the university to comply the claims. The claims are actively ignored. Early on this the misconduct was pointed out to responsible persons of the University of Cologne through the associations Decolonzie Cologne, Bonn Postkolonial, the nationwide Decolonize Network and representatives of Ovaherero and Nam from Namibia, Esther Utjiua Muinjangue (chairwoman of Ovaherero Genocide Foundation) und Sima Deidre Luipert (second chairwoman of Genocide Technical Committee of Nama Traditional Leaders Association) as well as the Tanzanian Mchagga-activist Aktivist Mnyaka Sururu Mboro (broad member of Berlin Postkolonial e.V. and Decolonize Berlin e.V.) and Israel Kaunatjike (Alliance „Völkermord verjährt nicht“ and Ovaherero-Stiftung Namibia). The request of the alliance to assume responsibility for the colonial-historical crimes and to reappraise the past which follows this letter was merely consoled by the university. We rate this behaviour of the university as inacceptable.
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