Maasai Issues in Summery

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The various issues discussed in this section are those concerning the Maasai people today.  The topics are based on day-to-day conversations from the local people.

Click hot links to select your topic of interest.

Wildlife & Habitat Conservation| Human & Wildlife Conflict| Conflict Resolution for Human & Wildlife| Maasai Land Management System| Cattle Overstocking| Overgrazing| Protected & non-protected areas| Maasai customary laws| Issues around Game Reserves| Lodges in Game Reserves| Cultural Bomas | Tourism & Tourists| Education| Health| Water| Maasai & the Market Economy| 

The Maasai people are faced with great challenges, and here is our perspective. 

Wildlife and habitat conservation

In East Africa, the mission for wildlife and habitat conservation has been about protecting wildlife and habitat. The indigenous people, who share the habitat with wildlife, have been neglected in the mission. The conservationists have treated the indigenous people as separate and a secondary matter of concern. 

"It is impossible to separate milk and water, so as to separate the Maasai people from wildlife and habitat conservation", said a Maasai elder. 

It is suggested that the conservationists and wildlife organizations should invest in the indigenous people, as they are the ultimate gateway to wildlife and habitat conservation in Kenya. The native people in turn will assume responsibilities and protect their habitat and wildlife they share the land with. 

Trackers, naturalists, and game wardens are professionals that are found in the native community. Investment to the native people could yield immediate and rewarding results for wildlife and habitat conservation.

It would be more costly to ignore the indigenous people than to work with them.

Environmental conservation should be about wildlife, indigenous people and habitat.

In the meantime, the Maasai people are being alienated in the land in which they are part of.

Human and wildlife conflict

The conflict between the Maasai people and wildlife is on the rise day after day. It is becoming difficult for the Maasai people to live in harmony with wildlife as a result of the new land tenure policies, introduced by external powers of authority, 

According to the Maasai people, the concept of protected and non-protected areas is among the policies attributing to human and wildlife conflict in the Maasai region. This land tenure policy appeared to be insensitive to the savanna ecology and culture. 

Here are typical cases of conflict between the Maasai people and wildlife: 

• Elephant destroying crops and injuring residents
• Lion attacking livestock, and
• Wildebeest grazing in privately owned land 

When a lion attacks a cow, the authorities from wildlife and conservationist organizations would bury their heads in the sand. When a Maasai warrior kills a lion because of killing his cow, the authorities would ferry security personnel to arrest the warrior. In other words, it is acceptable for a lion to kill a cow but not acceptable for a warrior to kill a lion. Lions are considered more important than the Maasai cows.

According to the Maasai people, the conservationist's solution to human and wildlife conflict is flawed, and should be reexamined. The Maasai community has offered some insight to this problem.

Responsible conflict resolution for human and wildlife

The Maasai are an integral part of the savanna's ecology and culture. They have been sharing the land with wildlife for centuries, and have sheltered the animals from poaching. For this fact, the Maasai knowledge and voice is imperative when finding a resolution to human and wildlife conflict.

It is a concern that the conservationist and wildlife organizations lack the financial means to fence all national game parks and reserves in East Africa.

Also, it is unlikely that the conservationist organizations would be able to give out compensation to every person whose property or life has been damaged by wildlife. The Maasai suggests that conservationists, wildlife organizations, and policy makers work on a collaborative effort with them to find practical solutions to human and wildlife conflict. 

With the absence of the Maasai people in the decision-making process, reliable conflict resolution for human and wildlife are difficult to attain. A collaborative effort between stakeholders is vital when crafting a conflict resolution for human and wildlife. 

Conservationists are blaming the Maasai people

The conservationists have continuously accused the Maasai and their cattle.The group claimed that the nomadic land management system and cattle overstocking are the major problems in the Maasai region, decimating pastureland and posing threat to savanna wildlife and habitat. 

The following is a Maasai reaction to the conservationists claim. 

Cattle overstocking, no longer a problem in the Maasai region

The conservationist's claim is false and vulnerable to criticism at this time of the century. Nowadays, it is rare to find a Maasai family with a hundred cattle. Cattle herd size has been reduced significantly, over along period of time, by the group ranch and schemes program, which was imposed on the Maasai people by the British colonial government in the 1950's. 

It is interesting to hear conservationists complain about cattle herd size while dismissing the number of game animals in the Maasai region. In fact, the number of wildebeest, zebras, and eland, among many other herbivorous, are in the thousands, exceeding the number of Maasai cattle. These animals roam in herds and graze day and night, while the Maasai livestock graze, only, eight hours a day. 

It is important for the conservationists to understand that livestock such as cattle, sheep, and goats are central to the livelihood of the Maasai people. Without cows the Maasai people would not be able to feed their families, educate their children, and to survive.

If the Maasai people were to abandon their cattle, as suggested by the conservationists, they would become beggars of foreign food-aid. 

The conservationist should find alternatives to their argument over herd size, unless their mission is to impoverish the Maasai people.

At this time, the Maasai people are retaining cattle according to availability of resources, water and grazing pastures. There is no excess of herd size in the Maasai region anymore. 

Overgrazing is natural, and is not new to the savanna

The conservationists should accept that overgrazing is a temporary natural condition ordinary to semi-arid lands. Wildlife and cattle, jointly, are the cause of overgrazing in the savanna. The problem of overgrazing has been in existence for hundreds of years, and could be lessened through the nomadic land management system. 

The nomadic land management system is ideal to the savanna

The nomadic land management system allows the Maasai people to manage grazing pastures and water sources in a sustainable manner. Reserved pastures are left fallow, for about three months, so the vegetation can rejuvenate. At this time, plants and grass would have sufficient time to recover between rainy and drought seasons. 

The Maasai have maintained the nomadic land management system for centuries. The system is sustainable to semi-arid land where rain is unpredictable. The system was ideal solution to the savannaís climate condition and vegetation. 

The concept of protected and non-protected areas

Protected areas are national game parks and reserves. Non-protected areas are places where the Maasai people live, outside the parks periphery. The concept of protected and non-protected areas is foreign to the Maasai people and to the wildlife, and has introduced conflict between the native and wildlife over land.

When the concept was introduced, the villagers believed that wildlife would be kept in protected areas. Contrary to this belief, wildlife continue to roam in non-protected areas daily. About 70% of wildlife in Kenya and Tanzania reside outside protected areas. Protected areas are not fenced.

The concept of protected and non-protected areas is undermining the trusteeship, a noble relationship, enjoyed by the Maasai and wildlife for centuries. 

This concept is confusing to the local people, and does not work in the savanna.  For one reason, the concept is attempting to draw a geometric boundary between the indigenous people and wildlife. The people would be able to abide by the rules of geometric boundaries but the wildlife will not be able to respect strict regulations and rules made by people.

It is impossible to replicate the western model of national parks to the savanna, simply because the culture and the environment are adversly different. 

It is important to understand that water and grazing pastures in the Maasai region are for wildlife, people, and cattle. These resources have been shared equally for decades, and have been regulated by nature. The resources are not to be regulated by a set of rules decided by urban developers. The situation should remain as it had been.

The Maasai believe that if not for their strength and will, the wildlife in the svannas of East Africa would have perished long ago.

As had happened in the past, when the original nature diminished, other tribes and westerners moved in and decimated the wildlife population. Mistakes should not be repeated.

The Maasai suggested that officials should revise the concept of protected and non-protected areas for the sake of human and wildlife welfare, and for the sake of national heritage. 

The Maasai Customary Law

The Maasai society has customary laws that protect Maasailand ecology and culture. Wildlife, habitat, and people are protected under the customary law. For example, the law prohibits people from fencing around water holes or grazing pastures. Wildlife is free to drink water and graze anywhere in Maasailand without property limits. The law prohibits, through taboo, the Maasai people from consuming game meat. Every Maasai understands and abides by the rules of customary law. 

The Maasai customary laws were established with a great deal of thought and concern to the savanna ecology and culture. It would be wise for the conservationist organizations, environmentalists, policy-makers, and land developers to recognize and integrate the Maasai customary laws with theirs, at least in matters related to wildlife and habitat conservation and management.

Philosophical and ideological differences between the Maasai and outsiders

The erosion of the Maasai traditional land management systems is a result of the British colonial government, enhanced by the current powers of authority in Kenya. It is these external powers that brought about social, cultural, and economic complexities to the Maasai region. The formation of game parks and reserves, group ranches and schemes are ideas developed from a philosophy of the outside world. 

It is concluded that the ongoing land conflict between the Maasai people and outsiders is a problem of philosophical and ideological differences. The outsiders want to have domain and control of the Maasai region. Their alternative motive is to parcel out the land and use it for wheat plantations, flower farms, and so on. The outsiders perceive Maasailand as a commodity for sale. 

The Maasai have a different concept about land. The land contains ancestral spirits, and is not a commodity for sale. The land must come first before human activities. Human activities must be culturally, spiritually, and environmentally sensitive to the land.

The Maasai people are suffering from the game parks and reserves

Most of the popular game parks and reserves, such as Amboseli and Maasai Mara, are situated in the Maasai region. Tourism is the number one foreign income earner in Kenya. Surprisingly, the Maasai, stewards of the land, receive no benefits from the national game parks and reserves. 

In addition, they are denied access to grazing pastures and water sources located in the game parks and reserves. The Maasai people consider this unfair.

Where do the revenues from the game parks go?

A portion of the funds are used to maintain the game parks and reserves, and to train game wardens. While much of proceeds from tourism are bagged and shipped to Nairobi for "appropriate" distribution.

The topocrats, running the game parks and reserves, are living a lavish lifestyle with fancy houses and big cars; most of them, if not all, have sent their children overseas for advanced studies.

Meanwhile poverty continues to rise 200 meters away from the game parks and reserves. 

Education in Maasailand

A significant number of Maasai children are not able to attend school due to lack of fees and school buildings. Many schools in the Maasai region are in poor conditions, and are usually over utilized. There are less than a handful of secondary schools in the region while college facilities are not available.

Maasailand has the highest primary school dropout rates in Kenya, mainly because of poor facilities and lack of support from those in power. Many Maasai children start their education late because schools are too far away from their communities.

Students, in many parts of Maasailand, have to walk an average of five miles, Monday through Friday, to attend school. A lot of them have been sent back home, on a monthly basis, by head teachers, due to lack of school fees, uniforms, and books. 

A limited number of students have completed secondary school, while a few of them attended college. 

Education is one of three most critical needs, among water and health clinics, in the Maasai region today.

Health clinics are unheard of in most of Maasailand

In southeastern Kenya, for example, women and children have to attend a health clinic located 60 miles away from their community. Only a limited number of people could make it to the clinic due to distance and economic hardship. 

A majority of the Maasai people still has a vague idea about HIV/Aids and tuberculoses (TB) epidemics. People are curious about such epidemics but the information remains scarce. 

For example, TB, a treatable disease is claiming lives in Maasailand on a daily basis. Many people don not even know whether they are infected with TB or not. Those infected with TB demand that they stay and die at home, rather than going to a hospital. Going to a hospital, to many Maasais, is a commitment of death. Many people still believe that TB is not treatable. Stigma, from the kin to the patient, is also becoming a serious problem in the region. The people are afraid of the sick, and the sick are afraid to go to the hospital.

The Maasai people are appealing to the national and international community for its assistance in Health Education and Disease Prevention Programs for HIV/AIDS and TB. The following type of program is what the Maasai people are yearning for. 

Community Health Education & Disease Prevention Program (a mobile program)
The program would help in the following areas:

• Promote awareness and prevention for Malaria, HIV/Aids and TB epidemic
• Provide villagers with vital information on solutions, opportunities, and alternatives necessary to avoid and cope with such epidemics

It is imperative to respnd to a situation at its early stages rather than later when the disease has become unmanageable. Any assistance you can offer in this area would be highly appreciated by the Maasai people.

Drinking water in Maasailand

Drinking water is critical in the Maasai region.

In the rainy season, the Maasai people depend on waterholes and swamps, shared by wildlife and livestock. The people are drinking ground water because they have no choice. Ground water is not safe for drinking, cooking, and cleaning. Many children have been exposed to cholera, some time in their life time, from drinking ground water.

In the Merrueshi Primary School, for example, every family with a child in school has to supply ten liters of water, each week, used to prepare lunch for students, and to water plants around the school compound. However, this request often became impossible for families to fulfill, particularly during the drought season. Most villagers have to walk an average of five miles to find water.

Many students in schools have often languished from thirst. This problem undercuts their studies, and has caused students to perform poor in schools. Nearly all schools in the Maasai region are faced with this same problem. 

Surprisingly, one of the largest water sources in Kenya, Kilimanjaro Water Development, is in the Maasai region. This water development was given to Kenya as aid by the Italian government, at the cost of about $1 billion shillings. The pipeline is snaking though Maasailand to Machakos, Makueni district, and Athi-River Town, leaving the Maasai people unserved. 

The cost of diverting water is beyond the powers of ordinary people. Wealthy Maasais are the only one with the power to divert the water.

The Maasai people are not benefiting from Kilimanjaro Water Project, even though the pipeline is cutting through their land. Water is one of the three critical needs in the Maasai region.

It is hoped that the Ministry of Water Development in Kenya could be kind to the Maasai people, and give them water free of charge, so long as the villagers can afford to divert water to their communities. This change will, without doubt, make education more attainable for Maasai children. Once the water becomes available, the Maasai community would be able to improve its standards of living. 

The real cost of water shortage, in most of Maasailand, is not a scarcity of water, rather a scarcity of democracy.

What do the Maasai need from the game parks and reserves?

• A share of revenue collected from tourists entering into local parks
• Access to grazing pastures and water sources located in the game parks (at least in the drought season) 
• Employment opportunity in game parks and lodges

These resources are vital to the social and economic improvement for the Maasai people.

It is hoped that the new government will consider the needs and the interest of the Maasai people, among other Kenyans, and give them subsidies from the revenues generated from the game parks and reserves. It is determined that if the funds from game parks and reserves were shared accordingly, water, education, and health problems would have been eradicated in the Maasai region.

Cultural Bomas

Cultural bomas are artificial Maasai villages alongside the game parks and reserves. These villages are designed to enable a few Maasais to sell art & crafts, i.e. beadwork, to tourists. However, most visitors to cultural bomas are there to take photographs; they already bought crafts in the lodge.

The idea of cultural bomas, around the game parks, is a promotion of cultural assimilation. The bomas are bringing a habit of dependency and is confusing the Maasai people. Some people from cultural bomas are finding it difficult to re-live a normal lifestyle once they return to villages.

Cultural bomas located next to the game parks are ultimately an introduction to reservations. They should be discouraged. From cultural bomas, the next step will be reservations.

The lodges in game parks are undermining the success of the indigenous people 

The curio shops situated in the lodges belong to the same people who own the lodges. Such curio shops are making it difficult for the native people to sell their arts and crafts, considering that most tourists do their shopping at the lodge before their visit to cultural bomas. 

Community empowerment through tourism

If the authorities and tourism operators are serious about community empowerment, through tourism, they should grant rights to the native people and allow them to run cooperative curio shops inside the game parks and reserves.

Cooperative curio shops are, without doubt, a small-scale income generating operation, however, they are more reliable than cultural bomas.

As of 2003, the Maasai people are still restricted from selling crafts inside the game parks and reserves. It is unfair to centralize the Maasai people in cultural bomas, outside the game parks, where culture is changed and visitation is unpredictable.

It would be rewarding to have the Maasai people run cooperative curio shops inside the game parks, where the tourists are available.

Maasai view of tourism & tourists

The Maasai people appreciate tourism as long as the sector can maintain the following manners: 

• Respect the local culture
• Bring constructive and respectful economic activities to the area
• Provide equal employment opportunity for all

The tourism industry is vital to the Kenya economy and to the Maasai people. If the benefits were shared economic problems in the Maasai region would have been reduced. Unfortunately, fruits from the tourism sector are limited only to a small group of people.

About 10% of Kenya's population, the ruling class, controls 35 per cent of the national income.

It is hoped that the new government will make it possible for indigenous communities such as the Maasai to benefit from tourism.

Tourists

The Maasai people welcome tourists to Maasai land. However, they suggest that tourists should respect individual and community privacy and difference. The way people do things in the Maasai world is different from the western world. It is strictly discouraged from taking photographs without consent from the individual or from the community. Respect the local culture, traditions, political world view, and customs. Respect the environment/habitat and its flora and fauna.

Lodges in Game Parks and Reserves 

Every game park and reserve in Maasailand has a number of lodges and luxurious tents. The reputation in such establishments has been dissatisfying to the Maasai people. The lodges are against the native people. The natives constitute less than 1% of staff in the lodges. There are no Maasais in managerial positions. A majority of the Maasais working in lodges are serving as security guards (watchmen). They are paid poorly, and have no benefits whatsoever.

It is hoped that the lodges would change their attitude toward the natives, and consider them for job training and employment opportunities. This would be a step forward for the lodges and for the natives. 

What about those dancers?

There are a number of Maasai dance troops in lodges. The dancers, composed of both men and women, receive between $30 and $60 per week. This amount is for the whole community that constitutes one hundred people. 

What about those Maasais selling crafts at the entrance of the game parks?

These Maasais are trying to catch up with the phase of the market economy. Many of them are without cattle, and have to find ways to feed their families and send their children to school. Selling crafts is the only income opportunity these people have. They would not be there if their children were educated and working at the lodge. In the mean time, they lack the financial means to remain in villages, and are forced to roam around the game parks for income opportunities. 

The Maasai people are struggling in the market economy

The concept of a market economy was, until recently, a foreign idea to the Maasai community. Since its introduction, a group of young Maasais, men and women alike, have gained interest in the market economy. Even though, the entrepreneurs are finding it difficult to thrive in the market economy. A number of different trends are the cause of this problem:

• Lack of practical business skills 
• Financial support from lending institution
• Low productivity in livestock production

Cattle are still the economic backbone for the Maasai people. However, livestock are too weak to be sold in the local markets. Lack of sufficient water supply, drought and diseases, namely render-pest, and foot-and-mouth diseases, are responsible for weak livestock. When the cattle are poorly nourished, the Maasai economy is also in depression. 

Livestock production could be improved if veterinary services and wells are available to the Maasai people. The villagers would be able to maintain these services but they need some financial assistance to initiate the services. 

Maasai people are interested in Micro lending programs

The Maasai people are exploring the idea of micro lending programs, which has been deemed more reliable than local commercial banks. The policies in the local commercial banks in Kenya are just too strict for pastoral communities. 

It has been determined that unequal distribution of wealth and power is a major problem in Kenya. A small group of elites control the resources such as capital and technology. There are no economic opportunities, whatsoever, for pastoral communities such as the Maasai. 

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