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Cattle grazing on the Salai Plains, Loliondo Game Controlled Area, Tanzania. © 2011 Susie Cazenove via Getty Images |
Where do you go when your ancestral land is being seized by the government in the name of conservation, but really to expand a tourist hotspot?
Residents of Maasai communities in Tanzania are facing this catastrophe as they once again risk losing land and livelihood.
When colonial authorities declared the Serengeti area a national park in 1951, communities within its borders were relocated to Ngorongoro district for permanent settlement. For the past half-century, these communities faced numerous evictions, and the government even burned their homes and destroyed their food stock to force them to leave. Regulations curtailed their rights to graze cattle and cultivate small gardens.
Now they’re being evicted again.
The government plans to displace about 150,000 Maasai people from Ngorongoro district and other regions and move them about 600 kilometers away, with little or no consultation.
Human Rights Watch recent traveled to these areas, and a new series of articles by our researchers highlights how these communities still wrestle with colonial-era policies that strip them of their right to live freely on their land. |
Maasai village in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, Tanzania, February 8, 2022. © 2022 Ahmad Aljuhma via Getty Images |
Today, two areas of Ngorongoro district are being targeted. The government wants to convert part of the Loliondo Game Controlled Area into a game reserve for trophy hunters. Last June, when residents there protested the evictions, the government responded with excessive force, leading to two days of violence.
The other location, the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site spanning vast areas of highland plains, savanna, savanna woodlands and forests. It sits next to the famed Serengeti National Park. Residents told HRW the government plans to reduce the main hospital’s staff size from 64 people to 2 people and that it shifted school funding to another district.
The Maasai people are semi-nomadic pastoralists who have lived on and managed the area alongside other native communities for more than 200 years. They strive to live harmoniously with wildlife. Their customs include taboos against consuming wildlife meat instead of beef and cutting down a live tree instead of using its branches. The way they manage their grazing promotes conservation of natural resources but requires large areas of land.
The government should halt the violence and forced evictions. It should work with Indigenous communities on a plan that respects their right to the land, heeds their traditional practices, and establishes how to work together to protect the area.
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