The statue of Kwakoe in the Surinamese capital Paramaribo is a monument commemorating the abolition of slavery.

Pengel unveiled the sculpture on June 30, 1963, as part of the centenary of slave emancipation in Suriname on July 1, 1963.

The statue of Jozef Klas was immediately adopted by the Afro-Surinamese as the best representation of the liberation from their history of slavery.

[3] Sculptor and painter Jozef Klas (Hannover 1923 - Paramaribo 1996) also made the statue of Mama Sranan, a unity monument, depicting a woman who keeps her children embraced.

[5][6] Kwakoe is also the name of a summer festival that has been held almost every year since 1975 during a number of weekends in the Nelson Mandela Park in Amsterdam-Zuidoost in the Netherlands.