Toby Alderweireld has urged people to “look at our history and learn from it” after a petition was launched to replace a statue of King Leopold II in Belgium with one of the Tottenham defender.
In the wake of the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, many statues of historic figures have been targeted by anti-racism protesters due to their prevalence in the slave trade or colonialism.
One of those was a statue of King Leopold II in Antwerp, Alderweireld’s home city, which was defaced and then removed. Leopold ruled Belgium from 1865-1909 but in his role as Sovereign of the Congo an estimated 10-15 million Africans died.