By Nicholas Osei-Wusu
A Professor of Asante History at Birmingham University in the United Kingdom, Professor Thomas McCaskie, has urged the traditional leadership of Asanteman to pursue a 400-thousand-ounce gold nugget treasure former Asantehene, Nana Kwaku Dua I bequeathed to his successor, Nana Kofi Kaakari.
This treasure, with a current monetary value of two billion pounds sterling, could however not be accounted for after Nana Kofi Kaakari was destooled following the Asantes’ defeat in the infamous ‘Sagrenti War’ with the British in 1874.
Professor McCastie revealed this in his Key Note Address at a Symposium in Kumasi to mark 150 years of the ‘Sagrenti War’.
“The money was stored in three places. It was stored in the Adaka Kesie-the great treasury-, it was stored at the Asantehene’s country Palace at Breman… and I wish to encourage the Asanteman to pursue further the matter of the restoration of the Treasury that was taken in 1874 and 1876,” Prof. McCastie revealed further.
The ‘Sagrenti War’ is one of the numerous battles between the Asantes and the British Army in which the Asantes were heavily defeated, with about four thousand of their warriors losing their lives.
The ‘Sagrenti’ is the corrupted form of ‘Garnet’, first name of General Garnet Wolseley, under whose command the British invaded Kumasi in 1874 in that battle during the reign of then-Asantehene Nana Kofi Kaakari.
The ‘Sagrenti War’ was influenced mainly by acts of disloyalty, betrayal and civil disobedience within the ranks of the Asantes occasioned by unsatisfactory rule by Nana Kofi Kaakari. Despite this humiliating defeat, the British could still not annex the Asante territory through this war. Interestingly, later years after the ‘Sangrenti War’ brought out the resilience, indomitability, and determination of the Asantes as a people, leading to the restoration of the Asante Confederacy in later years.
One hundred and fifty years of this infamous war has coincided with the 25th anniversary of the enthronement of then-Barima Kwaku Duah as the 16th occupant of the Golden Stool or Asantehene, now known as Otumfuo Osei Tutu Ababio.
These two major events are therefore being jointly commemorated, starting with a symposium bringing together renowned local and foreign Professors of History to take the current generation through the memory lane of this battle. Members of the panel—Prof. Samuel Adu-Gyamfi of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Prof. Samuel Ntewusu of the University of Ghana, and Prof. Eugenia Anderson, also of the KNUST—spoke about the cause and course of the ‘Sagrenti War’, the role of Christian missionaries, some of whom served as informants to the British Army, as well as the female factor in the battle.
“As we celebrate 150 years since the Sangrenti War occurred, it is important that we remember the heroes and heroines of history, including Afua Kobi, Yaa Achaa and Yaa Asantewaa,” Prof. Eugenia Asante urged.
Chairman of the Otumfuo Osei Tutu II Silver Jubilee Celebration and Juabenmanhene, Nana Otuo Serebuor, announced that the first batch of looted Asante royals’ regalia by the British has arrived in Kumasi and will be exhibited during a durbar of Asanteman to climax the Sagrenti War Commemoration.
There was a re-enactment of the ‘Sagrenti War’ by staff of the Kumasi Centre for National Culture.
During the symposium, a 709-page book titled ‘The History of Asanteman’, whose compilation was supervised by the 14th Asantehene, Otumfuo Sir Osei Agyemang, was outdoored by the Minister for Education, Dr. Osei Yaw Adutwum.
The book, edited by Prof. Tom McCastie, provides the true history of the Asantes and comes in handy as reference material for second-cycle and tertiary educational institutions.
