Meet the man 'seizing' African art from Western museums

Meet Mwazulu Diyabanza.

Back in June he stood in a Paris museum next to a 19th century funerary post from central Africa, and berated France for taking it and tens of thousands of other art works from its former colonies.

He and an associate prised the carved wooden ornament from its stand in the Quai Branly museum as a third man live-streamed the act on social media.

He was stopped by a security guard as he made for the exit.

Diyabanza is a Congolese activist who's lived in France for 20 years.

He belongs to a pan-African movement that demands France return colonial artifacts it expropriated from its subjugates and recompense for acts of slavery.

"We are continuing the struggle for recovery. The recovery process, it's the fight for getting back our wealth, which include these works of arts. When the Europeans arrived, the first bases they broke were cultural bases, which is why to start the reparation, first amongst ourselves, and to engage in these struggles for freedom, we start with the cultural bases."

Diyabanza appeared in court on Wednesday (September 30) charged with attempted theft.

Prosecutors demanded that he be fined 1,000 euros.

The judges will return their verdict later in October.

Some 90% of Africa's cultural heritage is now believed to be in Europe.

The Quai Branly Museum in Paris alone holds some 70,000 African objects.

It declined to comment on this case.

"What must be done in the meantime is that these museums must be decolonized. The decolonization of museums goes with the recognition, first of identifying the real owners, and to find a just solution."

At the time, French President Emmanuel Macron said that African heritage can't just be in European private collections and museums.

So far, fewer than 30 restitutions from French collections have been announced.

Diyabanza is also facing trial in Marseille, where he seized another artifact from a museum.