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Kenya's Castaways: The Ogiek and
National Development Processes
The Ogiek, who number around
20,000, are arguably the largest hunter-gatherer community in
Kenya. They have identified themselves as an indigenous people, as
defined in Article 1(b) of International Labour Organization
Convention No. 169,1 and the United Nations (UN) and the African
Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights have recognized them as
such.
It seems likely that the Ogiek are
aboriginal people of present-day East Africa and that originally
they occupied the whole central highlands region. Nagol, an Ogiek
elder recollects: 'Our forefathers told us that we occupied areas
around forests in this country, before other tribes started coming
in.'2 This is supported by other sources: 'They are a hunting and
gathering people of antiquity greater than the people among whom
they now live…'3
Today, the Ogiek occupy the Mau
Escarpment and Aberdare around the Rift Valley, as well as part of
the Mt Elgon Forest in western Kenya. The clan (Oret), constituted
by several local groups, is the land holding unit, and the most
important unit socially. The Ogiek do not have centralized
leadership institutions like chieftaincies or political councils.4
This report focuses on the
displacement of the Ogiek people from their land, their
underdevelopment and the threat to their culture. It also assesses
the impact on the Ogiek of the loss of their land.
Indigenous peoples' rights and
development
'These Dorobo [i.e. Ogiek] …
have been "driven like chaff before a wind of progression"
… we should now recommend a definite reserve for them.'5
This conclusion of the Carter Land
Commission6 (1932-8) gives a picture of what the Ogiek have
undergone over the years. The Commission recommended that the
Ogiek be allocated land near communities with whom they had
affinity, to enable assimilation. However, the Ogiek wanted
development on their own terms. According to Kaliasoi Chesimet, an
Ogiek elder in Tinet: 'The newcomers came and … cut down the
forest for tea and flower farms… the Ogiek should be allowed to
elect their own leaders and choose their own way of life on their
land.'
From colonial times onwards, Ogiek
groups have been displaced from their ancestral lands without
consultation, consent or compensation. They have been excluded
from development plans and pushed onto land that is not suitable
for their way of life. Joseph Towett sums it up: 'We are not only
being dispossessed of our ancestral lands, our livelihoods are
being killed. They say … that we must develop: but tell me,
where or what is this development?'7 Human rights scholars have
warned that development can be a catalyst for ethnocide.8
Culture is the fabric that holds
the Ogiek together. According to Mrs Rael Kibilo from Tinet
forest: 'Before our forests were cut down, we had our culture and
traditions … anyone who is destroying our forest is destroying
our culture.' Displacement from the forests that are their
cultural and spiritual temples erodes Ogiek culture and violates
international human rights standards, some of which Kenya is party
to (e.g. Article 15 of the International Covenant on Economic
Social and Cultural Rights, which Kenya has ratified).9
The Kenyan government controls
Ogiek ancestral lands through three Acts of Parliament: the
Government Lands Act (1970, revised 1986), the Forests Act (1957,
revised 1964) and the Wildlife (Conservation and Management) Act
(1977, revised 1985). Ogiek ancestral lands are gazetted as
government forests or national game parks/reserves. The government
is not required to consult the Ogiek with regard to development
plans.
Logging has been a major cause of
the destruction of the forests in Ogiek-inhabited areas,
especially from the 1990s onwards.10 Three giant logging companies
- Pan African Paper Mills, Raiply Timber and its sister firm,
Timsales Limited - are exempted from the general government ban on
the grounds that Raiply and Timsales 'employ over 30,000 Kenyans',
while the government itself has shares in Pan African Paper
Mills.11
Ogiek land has also been lost
through government excision. Such land has sometimes been
allocated to politically influential individuals under the pretext
of resettling squatters or environmental conservation.12 Excisions
have been ongoing since 1932 with 48,000 ha of forestland
converted to settlements under the Forests Act between 1963 and
1971.
Development projects have also
contributed to the loss of Ogiek lands, for example the
establishment of Mt Elgon Game Reserve in western Kenya in the
1980s - which became Mt Elgon National Park in 1992.
Ogiek ancestral land has also been
taken by private individuals under the existing land laws for
cultivation of export crops such as tea, pyrethrum (a plant used
to make insecticides) and flower farming. Pyrethrum cultivation is
bad for the traditional Ogiek activity of honey production - also
a viable foreign exchange earner - because the poisonous pyrethrin
kills bees.
The UN Committee on Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights stated that poverty arises when people
have no access to resources because of who they are, what they
believe or where they live.13 This is clearly relevant to the
Ogiek and explains why more than 95 per cent of the Ogiek are poor.
The impact of loss of land
The result of the loss of ancestral
lands among the Ogiek is poverty, illiteracy and poor health;
women are more disadvantaged because they lack property ownership
rights and thus tend to be poorer. This study established that
more than 90 per cent of the Ogiek could barely afford one proper
meal a day.14
The Ogiek, having lost their
traditional occupations,15 have been forced into cultivation
farming. They lack cultivation skills and are exploited by
middlemen when they seek to sell their produce.
One traditional Ogiek occupation,
honey production, could provide communities with a sustainable
income, especially if the honey was processed locally, instead of
being sold raw to middlemen.16 This would empower the community
economically.17 Currently, bee-keeping is compromised by charcoal
burning as well as pyrethrum cultivation. Charcoal burning
destroys the forest and the fumes from the burning kill the bees.
Poverty among the Ogiek has
resulted in high levels of illiteracy (more than 80 per cent),
since parents cannot afford the cost of education. Girls are most
affected by this. Most girls marry very young. Recently,
prostitution has emerged as many single-parent girls and women
seek to fend for themselves - leading to the spread of sexually
transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS.
Primary schools in Ogiek areas are
scattered and there is no single secondary school specifically
serving Ogiek children. Those who pass their primary school
examinations have to go to boarding schools far away. Dropout
rates are very high, especially at the secondary school level.18
Locked out of their pharmacies (the
forests), and without money to access health facilities, which are
in any case inadequate (there is only one doctor for the 6,000
people living in Mau), the health standards of the Ogiek have
plummeted. Kaliasoi Chesinet, an Ogiek elder from Tinet in Nakuru
District explains: 'The forest … is our hospital, where the
herbs are.'
The combination of poverty and
inability to access their traditional medicine has resulted in low
life expectancy for Ogiek people of about 46 years. Five out of
ten children die before the age of 5.
Environmental concerns
The process of forest exploitation
not only affects the Ogiek, it also spells disaster for Kenya as a
whole. Kenya requires 10 per cent forest cover for regular water
supply; today it has only 1.7 per cent. Kenya largely depends on
waters that flow from a handful of wooded catchments, the Mau and
Mt Elgon forested areas accounting for over 50 per cent of
these.19
Today, indigenous peoples have been
recognized as conservators of their environments by the
international community.20 'These communities are the repositories
of vast accumulations of traditional knowledge…. Their
disappearance is a loss for a larger society which could learn a
great deal from their traditional skills in sustainably managing
very complex ecological systems', noted the 1987 report, Our
Common Future by the UN Committee on Environment and Development
(the Brundtland Report).21 By allowing unhindered logging and
excision of forests, the Kenyan government transgresses the
principles of sustainable development.
The continued use and management of
the Mau, Aberdare and Mt Elgon ecosystems in Kenya by the Ogiek is
of vital importance. Their traditional economic system has a very
low impact on biological diversity. Says Kaliasoi Chesinet: 'When
we wanted an animal, we took just one, not all at once.' Moreover,
through a totem, each clan was allocated an animal to protect and
no member of that clan would hunt that animal. Also, bee-keeping
helped pollinate and regenerate the forests. Finally, with the
forests acting as their pharmacies, the Ogiek knew better than to
destroy them.
Indigenous knowledge of the
ecosystems is learned and updated through observation, so removing
the Ogiek from their ancestral land will break the generational
cycle of learning. Gathering the wild fruits, berries, roots and
herbal barks for food and medicines was the task of Ogiek women
and children; the women transmitted their knowledge to the next
generation. Maintaining the richness of traditional knowledge
depends largely upon the Ogiek continuing to use their land as a
classroom and laboratory.
The Ogiek struggle
The response of the Ogiek to the
violation of their land rights is well documented.22 From the
international to the local level, the Ogiek have fought further
alienation of their lands, and attempted to regain ownership of
the lost lands.
They have been represented by their
organizations at forums like the World Summit on Sustainable
Development in 2002, the World Conference Against Racism in 2001
and the UN Working Group on Indigenous Peoples. Other NGOs and
civil society organizations have argued their case at these forums,
and at the UN Working Group on Minorities.
At the local level, the Ogiek
struggle has focused on demonstrations, court cases and
participation in the Land Reform and Constitution of Kenya Review
Processes. The legal process has been frustrating. Cases have been
deliberately delayed or have attracted hostile judgments. In a
ruling of 15 March 2000, two High Court judges found that the
Ogiek had renounced their ancient traditions and hence forfeited
their land rights.
The Ogiek now believe that it is
only through a proper constitutional dispensation that their
rights can be protected. Commenting on the constitutional review
process, Kilisha Lekwenan (102 years) called upon Kenyans to come
up with a Constitution that will embrace unity in diversity. 'This
Constitution comes at the right time', he said.
Recommendations
To the Kenyan government:
- The Kenyan
government should ensure that a new Constitution is drafted
and implemented as soon as possible. This Constitution should
recognize the existence of indigenous peoples in Kenya, their
right to have their identity protected and their right to
possession of land, with full compensation if this right is
interfered with.
- The Kenyan
government should implement its international obligations that
apply to indigenous peoples. In addition, it should ratify and
implement ILO Convention 169 on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples.
- Consideration
for the rights of indigenous peoples should be mainstreamed
into all development policies and programmes. The Ogiek should
be consulted about all future development that could affect
them or their land.
- All
exemptions from the logging ban in Ogiek-inhabited areas
should be ended.
- The Kenyan
government should establish disaggregated data on indigenous
communities in Kenya in relation to all socio-economic
indicators, to ascertain the levels of development of these
communities and establish their needs.
To the international
community:
- International
community organizations (donors, development actors,
international NGOs and UN agencies) working in Kenya should
mainstream indigenous peoples' rights into their development
activities when they work in areas inhabited by these
communities. In particular, they should ensure that the Ogiek
people are consulted before any activity is undertaken that
could affect them.
- A
particular focus should be made on the education of the Ogiek
people, in particular women, to enable them to effectively
advocate for their rights at the national, regional and
international levels.
- The
international community and the Kenyan government should set
up an inquiry into past breaches of the rights of the Ogiek,
particularly the seizure of their land. This inquiry should,
within a reasonable time, publish its findings, including its
recommended compensation and/or restitution for any breaches.
Notes
1.
Article 1(b) identifies indigenous peoples as: 'People in
independent countries who are regarded as indigenous on account
of their descent from the populations which inhabited the
country … at the time of conquest or colonisation … and who
… retain some or all of their own social, economic, cultural
and political institutions.'
2. All quotes from Ogiek people are from research by CEMIRIDE
for the Minority Rights and Development Programme during 2002
and Survival International (V. Luling, interviews in Tinet,
2002).
3. See Yeoman, G., 'High Altitude Forest Conservation in
Relation to the Dorobo', Kenya Past and Present, vol. 3, 1933.
4. See Ogot, B.A. (ed.) Economic and Social History of East
Africa, Nairobi, Kenya Literature Bureau, 1976.
5. Dorobo is a derogatory name given to the Ogiek by Maasai. It
means 'very poor men', as the Ogiek did not own any livestock.
6. The Carter Land Commission was set up in 1932 by the
Secretary of State for Colonies, to consider the land
requirements of the African population.
7. Joseph Towett is the Chairman of the Ogiek Welfare Council
(OWC), a community-based NGO. Other Ogiek organizations are the
Ogiek Integrated Rural Project, Ogiek Peoples' Development
Program, ODECECO and the Chepkitale Indigenous Peoples Trust.
8. See Stavenhagen, R., The Ethnic Question, Tokyo, United
Nations University Press, 1990. He argues that ethnocide is a
process in which a culturally distinct people loses its identity;
it encompasses both economic and cultural dimensions which are
embedded in the theories and practices of development and nation
building.
9. Kenya has also ratified the International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights (see esp. Articles 1, 27); the
International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Discrimination (see esp. Articles 1, 2); the Convention on the
Rights of the Child (see esp. Article 30).
10. See www.ogiek.org/report/ogiek, esp. Ch. 4.
11. See Astill, J., 'Tribal trials', The Guardian 13 March 2002,
p. 8.
12. 'Church queries state over forests', Sunday Nation, 15 July
2001, www.nationaudio.com.
13. UN Doc. E/C.12/2001/10; 10 May 2001, para. 11.
14. Minority Rights and Development Programme research by
CEMIRIDE
in 2002.
15. See Traditional Occupations of Indigenous and Tribal
Peoples: Emerging Trends, Geneva, ILO, 2000, p. 80.
16. The Ogiek are known as 'the honey-hunters of Kenya'. The
Ogiek Peoples' Development Project (OPDP) runs a small-scale
bee-keeping project.
17. Government bee-keeping projects initiated in the 1970s in
Busia and Luo Nyanza in western Kenya and in Ukambani in eastern
Kenya failed. Unlike the Ogiek, however, these communities had
no knowledge of bee-keeping.
18. Out of a population of about 20,000 people, the Ogiek
community has fewer than five university graduates. Unemployment
is common even among those who have gone to school, because
their level of educational attainment is inferior to that of
children from communities well-serviced with educational
facilities.
19. The Daily Nation quoted UN consultants as saying that the
forest excisions will negatively impact on the Aberdare circuit
and the Mau Hills catchment areas. They warned that, ultimately,
communities in Nyanza Province and the planned Sondu-Miriu
hydroelectric power project would be affected. The targeted
forests were Mau complex, Nakuru, Nabkoi, Mt Kenya, Marmanet,
North Tinderet, Londiani, South Nandi, Molo and Kapsabet, a
total of 167,000 ha (see Daily Nation, 10 March 2001,
www.nationaudio.com).
20. The World Summit on Sustainable Development (2002)
reaffirmed the vital role of indigenous peoples in ensuring
sustainable development. The UNDP Human Development Report of
2000 reaffirms the link between cultural diversity and
biological diversity.
21. World Commission on Environment and Development, Our Common
Future, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1987; www.doc.mmu.ac.uk/
aric/eae/Sustainability/Older/Brundtland_Report.html
22. See www.ogiek.org/report.
SOURCE: http://www.minorityrights.org/Dev/mrg_dev_title7_kenya/mrg_dev_title7_kenya_pf.htm
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