Ciara’s Beninese citizenship: marketing ploys can’t heal the past

By: Kwasi Konadu, Colgate University, The Conversation

Outlets: The Conversation

Published: November 21, 2025

Words: 1,251

Last Updated: 3 days, 18 hours ago

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By Kwasi Konadu, Colgate University

African American singer Ciara received citizenship from the Republic of Benin in 2025 as a descendant of enslaved Africans. The images of her ceremony at Ouidah’s slave route memorial site, “Door of No Return”, were broadcast worldwide. Surrounded by drummers and dignitaries, she held a new Beninese passport aloft, a gesture hailed as both homecoming and healing.

As a historian of Africa, the African diaspora and Ghana, …

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