The Land is our Life

Sinandei Makko, one of the founders of African Initiatives’ partner the Ujaama Community Resource Trust, talks about the importance of land to pastoralist communities in Tanzania, and why everyone else wants a slice.

“The Maasai pastoralists are a nomadic community living in northern Tanzania and Kenya. Pastoralism is a way of life based primarily on raising livestock including cattle, sheep, goat and camel on arid and semi-arid lands.  For pastoralists, the three most important things, the three pillars of society, are land, livestock and family. But pastoralism is not necessarily considered important by many policy makers.

The eco system is fragile in northern Tanzania. There is unpredictable rainfall and in order to co-exist with wildlife pastoralist land requires integrated and sensitive resource management. The practice of livestock herding keeps all members of each household in these communities busy throughout their lives. Pastoralists live a nomadic lifestyle as they are constantly on the move, searching for water and pastures and managing the land carefully to allow the regeneration of endangered plants. Their lifestyle is ‘holistic’ which takes into consideration socio-economic and natural resource conservation of environment and wildlife.

 

Most of the land the pastoralists use is labeled “a strategic national economic zone” because the good scenery and rich wildlife promote tourism. This influences Tanzanian politics and economy and creates huge land use conflict which has resulted in land grabbing, local community eviction and the displacement of pastoralist families from their ancestors’ land.

 

Land grabbing is caused by a lack of understanding and recognition of pastoralism which result in unsympathetic policies and ultimately – social injustice. National Policies such as wildlife and conservation continue to separate human and wildlife conservation, like the Wildlife Act of 2009. Keeping these two things separate does not make sense. Pastoralist people live with wildlife and their land continues to be the habitat of wildlife. Pastoralism can co-exist with wildlife.  

UCRT educates pastoralist communities on the importance of securing land rights and developing land use plans which map the different ways the land is used by communities; whether for grazing, water, habitation or buildings such as schools. We secure titles for grassland and work to broaden dialogue by strengthening community voices in the country amongst policy and decision makers.

When you think about pastoralism, the land affects everything. We want this basic fact to inform livestock and wildlife policy reforms impacting on all parts of the pastoralist way of life – health care, education, women’s rights, governance, conflicts and livestock production.

We are just as important as wildlife. And we can work together.”

 

 

Developing Talents

Nasiri Yasin Mwinyikondo attends CASEC’s Youth Centre in Arusha, Tanzania. This is his story.

“My name is Yasin and I’m 22 years old. I live in Arusha town at Daraja Mbill. I got my secondary certificate at school but didn’t get a chance to continue with higher education. This was a big disappointment and a challenge for me. Without a good education life is hard.

Then I found that I had a talent in  fine art and crafts. So I started this job so that I could help my family and myself. When I started this work in 2009 my parents were not sure of what I intended to do or whether I could manage it.

I use banana plant leaves to make picture frames, hand bags, pen holders and many other products. It is not as easy as I thought it would be. People don’t value this sort of work – it makes is hard for artists to establish themselves. Many Tanzanians don’t value things made from traditional materials.

In 2012 I decided to join CASEC’s youth centre so that they could help me advance my talent and promote my products. When I joined I found more interests because there I met with a lot of youths with different ideas and talents. This has improved my determination and I shared ideas with other people. I’ve improved my skills and the quality of my products.

I thank CASEC because they have helped me to promote my work through my participation in Nane Nane exhibitions in Arusha. This has helped me to be known by the community and potential customers who have helped me to improve my products by using other materials and not just banana leaves. It has encouraged me a lot and helped me know how to deal with different customers with different tastes and interests. Also, I learned that not all people will accept your products, they will discourage you.

There are still problems. I don’t have a special show room where customers can easily visit me. And it’s hard to fix the right price for your products which will both attract customers and enable you to make a good profit when you take into consideration the amount of time spent on producing one item.

But, I can see that life has changed in the last year. It is better now.”

The Unseen

Simon Daffi Kirway, one of the Project Officers at CASEC (an African Initiatives’ partner in Tanzania) came over to the UK for nearly 3 months earlier this year on a Commonwealth Professional Fellowship. One of the biggest things he took away from that experience was the UK approach to inclusive education. When he returned home to Tanzania he decided to do his own research into the situation of children with disabilities in schools in Mbulu and Kilolo districts. He has just sent us a report outlining his findings. 

For Simon, these children are the “unseen”, hidden in the community by their parents because of common misconceptions, including that these disabilities are a “curse”. “They are not given medical care when they’re sick, let alone being enrolled in school” Simon reports, “their mothers struggle to help them, regardless of what other people’s beliefs are, but it’s hard.” 

There are not only barriers to education from their communities. In Tanzania there is one teacher training institution for special needs teachers, Patandi. Each year between 378-400 teachers graduate. They have to be spread across 25 regions of Tanzania and Zanzibar and are not even always posted to teach in schools which provide inclusive education. Demand for these teachers is always very high. In Mbulu district only 2 schools out of 140 had ‘inclusive classrooms’. There was no provision for assistant teachers or community volunteers. This means that when teachers are ill and cannot teach the children cannot go to school. In Dongobesh Chini Primary School the inclusive classroom was temporarily closed in December 2011 because the teacher was sick. For 5 months. 

Teachers report budget constraints. Children with learning difficulties are not funded: although a government programme requires the central government to pay 25,000Tsh per child the schools have yet to see it. They say that they do not have resources to work with, one District Education Officer said “Why should you bother with children who are impaired, while as a district we have not been able to respond effectively to the needs of those who are okay?” Some parents even see teachers as an opportunity for respite care, for relief from the burden of responsibility that lies on them. One teacher stated, “In my town here community members openly referred to these children as my own children. They believe that I’m responsible for teaching them, meeting their medical care, food and clothing costs.”

Change is beginning however. At Endigot Primary School a local councillor mobilised communities to construct toilets suitable for children with learning difficulties using government funding proving. This proves that change can be driven by the community. Policy too is moving forward; it is now a government requirement that all government secondary schools should be adapted to become more user friendly by 2014. 

Now CASEC, too, are looking for ways in which they as a community grassroots organisation can build the capacity of schools and their communities to educate children with disabilities. Something African Initiatives is committed to working with them on. Together we can lift the curtain on ‘the unseen’.

Changing the World one MP at a Time

For a small organisation such as African Initiatives it is hard to have the impact we would like on policy change, particularly when the policies which need changing are on the other side of the world. In fact we learn a lot from our partners in Africa, especially CASEC, on the ways in which they influence change and their ‘softly, softly’ approach of building relationships over time and then making requests of their change makers. When we find a member of parliament who listens to the issues we are shouting about it is something to celebrate.

Recently, our CEO heard that her local MP in Wells, Tessa Munt had a keen interest in Africa and East African history in particular. When Rosie met her she was able to talk frankly, and face to face about the difficulties faced by Tanzanian pastoralists who are fighting for their land and those daughters who are fighting to go to school. This means a direct link into parliament; one more MP who knows what is happening and who can help to direct the British government’s reaction to these injustices. Ms. Munt talked to Rosie about the potential for African Initiatives to benefit future generations of young Africans with the programmes we and our partners are running. To gain the interest and support of a local MP with an existing understanding of Africa will be vital for African Initiatives as, with our partners, we continue to fight for justice and equality.

To see more on Rosie’s meeting with Tessa please click here

Land Rights in Tanzania - Update from our partners PWC

African Initiatives has just received this update from our Tanzanian partner, the Pastoral Women's Council (PWC), regarding local pastoralist's land dispute with Tanzanian Conservation Ltd (TCL) which has the same ownership as US based company Thomson Safari.

"Just now the DC [District Commissioner] is harassing Maanda and Melau (PWC staff) and has locked up 5 men for 'trespassing' on the [Thomson Safaris/TCL] farm where they were grazing livestock but you can't trespass on disputed land. The men are still in prison, they were imprisoned on Friday as the DC is 'making an example of them'. They are due in court tomorrow but no one wants to be accountable for locking them up. The DC won't appear so the police won't appear. Shilinde (Advocate) is in Loliondo with 2 journalists to try and expose the DC for what he is doing. The DC has threatened to de-register PWC as he claims we send the men to the [Thomson/TCL] farm to 'intimidate Thomson tourists'. The DC also threatened to lock up Maanda and Melau but nothing has come of this.

Melau spoke to the DC and he has somewhat relented from his initial state of confrontation. Last news is that more Maasai have taken their cattle to graze in the disputed area in retaliation of the DC's action, without, and I emphasize, any encouragement from PWC. Thomson's new manager, John, seems very reasonable and perplexed by all the recent goings on. The same men were arrested last week and he called to have them released but then they were of course re-arrested this time without bail. As of yet we still await the court case."

Clubbing Together

Val Bishop explores one of  the most successful initiatives in our girls' education programme in Tanzania

In Ngorongoro, Kilolo and Mbulu districts in Tanzania girls are becoming a force to be reckoned with. African Initiatives’ partners the Pastoral Women’s Council (PWC) and the Community Aid and Small Enterprises Consultancy (CASEC) are working with schools to establish ‘girls’ clubs’ in 40 secondary schools. These clubs aim to empower girls through exploring their rights, and helping them to build the confidence to claim them. In Ngoronogoro District PWC work with Maasai groups, where girls have to find their place in a highly patriarchal society and have to overcome huge challenges. Often parents and communities do not see the worth in educating girls, it costs money and is there any point investing it in daughters when they will leave the family fold and marry into another? Often they marry early; often they are forced to marry early. Their dowries come in useful.

Nabaya Parmya is one of the girls who has benefited. She is 15 years old and attends Lake Natron Secondary School. Both a member and secretary of the club she has seen changes in others and experienced them herself. Nabaya says that she has had “the opportunity to learn about issues affecting my education like HIV/AIDS, female genital mutilation and pregnancy as well as to talk openly about problems at school. I understand my rights better and how I can communicate with people in order to stand up for them. In Maasai culture, girls have no say on any issues that affect their lives” It is Nabaya’s father, elder brothers and uncles who determine her destiny.

Girls’ Clubs like the one at Lake Natron help students like Nabaya to access rights that we in the west often take for granted. When Nabaya grows up she will be able to pass this knowledge to her children. In this way girls such as Nabaya can help change an entire community. And it starts with a club.

Val Bishop

Head of Communications

val@african-initiatives.org.uk

Going Global at Sexey's School, Somerset

Tuesday 26th June saw the first of the summers Go Global Days at Sexey's School in the south west of England.  Ellen Hubbard, African Initiatives' volunteer gives her account of the very long, but rewarding day.

The day started bright and early, I met with Sian and the other volunteers at the African Initiatives office at 6am - a shock to the system but I soon saw the necessity of it.  We arrived at Sexeys School in Somerset by 7.30am, meeting two more of the team of 12 volunteers there.  Luckily Sian took on a ‘mothering role’, supplying us with breakfast and snacks, and generally making sure that we (her volunteers) were well looked after.

The hour of unloading, orientating ourselves in the school and setting up flew by.  I had organised the resources into boxes for each of the workshops the previous week, so found myself on the ball at this point trying to help to ensure that the right resources went to each volunteer.  With 10 workshops in total covering; Malawi – Sustainable Inventions, Ghana – Adinkra Printing, New Zealand – The Haka, China – Storytelling and Asia – Playground Games there were a lot of resources!

My main role during the sessions with the 240 Key Stage 3 students was to support Manuela who was running a workshop about New Zealand, where students learned the famous Haka. Even though I had looked through the workshop previously, I felt that I was learning more about Australasia and in particular New Zealand in all four of the sessions I helped run. This pleased me because if I was learning then surely the students were, right? Manuela and I wanted to try and encourage all the students to get involved and have a go. It didn’t take them long to get into doing the Haka, and then creating their own.

In session two I went to support another volunteer, Immanuel, who was running the Malawi workshop.  I was fascinated to learn the story of William Kamkwamba, a 14 year old boy from Malawi who had built a windmill from a picture he had seen in a book he borrowed from the library.  Using materials he found in a scrap yard he generated electricity for his family home, and eventually the whole community. It really is a story that makes one want to shout ‘if there is a problem, don’t sit back, work on a solution!’  And this is what the students did in the workshop.  Using junk materials they had previously collected, they built models of inventions that could encourage sustainable development in just 20 minutes.

After the fifth and final workshop all the students returned to the main hall for a short assembly and debriefing of the day. As part of this Sian got every single person on their feet, and Eleanor and Manuela led all the 240 students plus staff in a huge group Haka!  I performed it at the front with some student volunteers for everyone else to follow. This truly was amazing and a lovely end to the day, which was then topped off by the thanks we were given; the school gave a thank you card, flowers and a box of chocolates to each volunteer.

I learnt a lot from the day, and really enjoyed working to increase the awareness of a world that has always intrigued me, and which I believe everyone should be encouraged to explore and get to know. Even if the students only enjoyed the day half as much as I did, and learnt half as much as I did about New Zealand in each of the workshops, then it was certainly a success.

Since this Go Global day I have danced the Haka to myself each time I needed to lift my mood, it works so well! I am already looking forward to any opportunity I get to be involved with future Go Global days, and I think I would now even have the confidence to run a workshop myself.

For more information and to book a Go Global day at your school please visit www.globaleducationinitiatives.org.uk/go-global-days

Day 8: The Onion

Today was my last full day in Tanzania. Perhaps it is the case that we can never truly understand another culture, especially one which has such essential differences to one’s own; but to me Tanzanian culture is like an onion. You peel back one piece of skin and feel a rush of knowledge before you realise that there is another, and then another layer. On the one hand there is a fierce traditionalism, coupled often with religion and strong moral values and boundaries; on the other a young Tanzanian culture which embraces sometimes more western values such as clubbing. Are they in conflict with each other or just different threads of the same cloth? 

One of the CASEC members of staff, Huruma is getting married this week. His brother explained to me that as well as the wedding ceremony there is a ‘send off’ ceremony for the Bride, and (which greatly excites me) a ‘kitchen party’, which is attended only by women who bring kitchen gifts and offer advice on how to be a good wife. (I wonder if John Lewis do lists for this?) 

Sometimes projects are like that onion – there are many layers to them. One aspect of our girls’ education project is to work with communities to build dormitories, and train teachers as Matrons/Patrons who can supervise them to ensure the girls are safe. Pendo, a young, feisty, twenty-something woman working at CASEC believes they are much more than that,

“The project touches everywhere, including girls’ health and psychology. The matron or patrons we train… They are so important. I always talk to girls in the field. They had infections, not sexual infections but urinary tract infections because they did not know how to look after themselves or because of the clothes they wore. They were so scared. 

It is a big condition over here but they had no one to go and talk to, even the teachers isolated themselves. At one school there was only a Head Mistress and no other female teachers, the girls cannot go and talk about that with their head! The girls didn’t know that they had the right to talk to a teacher about things like this. Even the teachers didn’t know they could be more than teachers and have different roles. The chance of talking to someone freely was a big thing.” 

Sometimes, when you live in a world where it is so easy to access information through the click of a mouse we forget what it is like not to know. Now, even schools who are not building dormitories are requesting that CASEC organise the training of matrons and patrons for them, seeing that they improve the school infrastructure and benefit their students. Says Pendo: “It’s not about dormitories, about rights; it’s about who we are.” 

You only have to speak to Pendo to see how passionately she feels about these issues. In a predominately male sector she holds her own despite her youth. Like that onion she too has layers. In fact, she was runner up in Miss Tanzania a few weeks ago which has given her some status – she has been highlighted as a role model for girls in meetings with District Education Officers. Today, I asked her jokingly whether she’d thought about entering politics. She laughed, “From what I see, politicians stand up and lie. I couldn’t do that – I need to be with the girls.”

I leave CASEC thinking that there lies the power in the work we do together. We are all with those girls.

Sadly, here ends my Tanzanian journey, I can only recommend that you come and have your own - in the immortal words, I will be back, 
Thanks for joining me.Asante sana. Kwaheri.

Day 7 - The Girl Effect

Random Tanzanian experiences of the day. On the way out to a meeting we passed a petrol station with the usual beautifully manicured grounds and….. 2 Brontosauruses displayed on the forecourt. The mind boggles.  I have also seen the best mobility scooter ever – a wheelchair with the front of a bike attached to it. Even better, the guy was motoring down the road, full pelt in the middle of Tanzanian traffic; an incredible act of bravery. 

Not sure if you’ve ever heard of ‘the girl effect’? It is something to do with men but not in the way you might imagine. The girl effect is something to do with all of us. Put simply, it could change the world. Today, more than 600 million girls live in the developing world and the total global population of girls, already at its highest point ever is set to peak in the next decade. Approximately only a ¼ of these girls are not in school. Are we feeling depressed yet? 

Let’s flip the coin and think about those ¾ who are in school, and the impact that they have on their families, their communities and their countries. When a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education (that’s getting into secondary school folks) she marries 4 years later and has, on average 2.2 children less. An extra year of primary school boosts girls’ eventual wages by 10 -20%. An extra year of secondary school, 15-25%. Tellingly, there is a well known Swahili saying “Educate one women and you educate an entire family”.*

As you will have gathered if you have been reading this blog whilst I’ve been out here – many of the programmes our partners deliver are based around education; whether this is girls’ education, HIV/AIDS education, CASEC’s Youth Centre or Land Rights. What we haven’t really mentioned is community education. PWC have just begun work on a Song and Dance project. Its aim is clear; we want to get girls into primary school to implement our secondary school projects. Although primary education is universal in Tanzania, the number of girls enrolled in Maasai districts is low and the drop out ratio, high – often due to forced early marriages. 

What this project does is to take traditionally and commonly used Maasai ways of communication (song, dance and drama) and use them instead of the western “meetings” to educate parents and local government as to the importance of sending girls to school. This is the first time this methodology has been used in Tanzania. A Kenyan group has trained community trainers who work with children in 15 schools to develop songs, dances and dramas which they then perform. It’s an exciting project – and, although only going for 7 months is already seeing results. 

The beauty of it is that it’s not PWC educating parents and local policy makers – it’s the kids themselves. And you can’t get much more powerful than that.

*I don’t have all these facts in my head by the way, if you would like the sources please email me val@african-initiatives.org.uk, tweet @AIGlobal or facebook African Initiatives.

Day 6 – Land Rights and Fights

Sunday is not a day of rest for my colleague Christine and myself. Today we are meeting an organisation based just outside of Arusha, CEDESOTA, working on land rights. Jackson, the Coordinator is taking us out to one of the wards (consisting of 4 villages) where they work. 

We set out on the road to Kilimanjaro – one of the highways in Tanzania. Again I am impressed by the well maintained lawn and flower beds which surround the businesses and hotels we pass. They take such care of things in this country. We drive past a car dealership selling shiny new 4x4s, blue tractors and red motorbikes. The scene is juxtaposed by the herds’ boy passing with his goats, grazing along the road as they go, and framed by the tree covered hills and mountains – old and new Tanzania. 

I am enthralled still by the ‘garden centres’ one finds by the side of roads in Tanzania – beautiful plants, trees and shrubs lined up carefully in neat lines , ready for buyers to jump out of their cars. There are no garden gnomes here, instead, a pair of tall ceramic geese.  The further we get out of Arusha the more coffee plantations we see, mixed in with maize and the banana trees, looking as though they are ready to launch into the sky, and which, it appears, can grow virtually anywhere. 

About 30 kilometres outside the city we leave the “tarmac road” as Jackson calls it. At the mouth of the track we’re taking stand the usual assortment of stalls and small shops: a hair dresser, vegetable sellers. Soon we have driven through these and there is nothing for miles except a sea of sunflowers. Initially they are green and growing but as we clock up the miles the plants become brown, the leaves tissue paper like, brittle. There has not been enough rain here. The local villages will suffer. 

We pass a boy with an 8 foot metal joist balancing precariously on the back of his bike; another is leading a solitary cow by a rope. The road is bumpy, crumpled by a giant’s hand. We are now in pastoralist areas we are told. Some have been forced to settle due to increasing pressure on land and we catch a glimpse through the sunflowers of a small blue house with an immaculate garden and chicken coup. 

Land is an issue in Tanzania. Pastoralists, traditionally nomads who travel with their herds using the different seasons as their guide, are now fighting against those who wish to put the land to other uses, whether they be tourist companies, multinationals or the Tanzanian government. African Initiatives are about to start a new project with the Ujaama Community Resource Trust (UCRT), an organisation who has worked in the Ngorongoro district for many years. In the past African Initiatives has supported UCRT and their communities to put together Land Use Plans, legal documents which legalise the pastoralist right to use their land, their way. This new programme goes a step further. For the first time UCRT will work with multiple villages to secure rights over communal grazing land, so important for their livelihoods and, of course often the only water sources in the area. The project will reach 64,000 pastoralists. Importantly, it will also secure land rights for 33,000 women- traditionally unable to own land. 

As we drive back towards the tarmac road I wonder how my community would act if we had to suddenly fight for our right to live there. The villages which UCRT will work with, and those supported by CEDESOTA would, I think, have a big advantage over us – they are united. And as Jackson says, “We cannot succeed if we are not united.”

Day 5 - Opening Eyes

A glorious day in Arusha today. On the way to the CASEC offices we passed a wide expanse of lush green bush, leading up onto a forest covered hill. Randomly there were two wicker chairs sitting there with a small wicker table between them. Almost as if they were ready for us to sit down and watch a reality TV show with a difference. 

I spent last night catching up with African Initiatives’ ex Volunteer Jill who came out to Tanzania in January to volunteer for 6 months. She now has a job with PWC, one of our partners who, she tells us have just received a grant from Oxfam to help build the capacity of school councils to demand their rights. Schools proved to be a theme today as I trained CASEC staff and volunteers in School Partnerships, or links. In the UK a lot of my work is around supporting these between schools in the south west of England and the rest of the world. Because of our work in Africa I often get asked whether we can facilitate links with Ghana and Tanzania, and, according to the Head Mistresss of Sombetini Secondary School yesterday, schools here want to expose their students to the ideas and friendship of another country just as much as our own. 

In the CASEC offices, above the door as you leave to climb up the wide steps and see the large, freshly cut lawn, you see a portrait of Julius Nyerere, the first President of Tanzania with the title Baba wa Taifa underneath it – Father of the Nation. The jury may be out elsewhere on Nyerere’s socialist policies, but within Tanzania he remains defiantly popular. 7 people have asked me whether I know of him, and when I say I have, I receive satisfied nods as if I have passed a test. He was called Muralimu, the teacher and it was he who said (I may be paraphrasing) “Take all the money you give in aid to Tanzania and spend it teaching your children about the causes and effects of poverty”. 

School partnerships do this on both sides – the developing world does not hold copyright on poverty. It exists everywhere. Partnerships allow children to see this, to realise that there are challenges everywhere, to see that they are not alone. Young people who may never have come into contact with different cultures suddenly have a ‘way in’ that means something to them; they have a context to share. Teachers have the opportunity to explore new methodologies, new ways of working and expand their own horizons. 

Today we talked about how every partnership has to be equity-based. This is harder than you may think. The way of the world is that one school will be wealthier than the other. However It is the materialism within us, and our society, which couples wealth to money. There are far more important things that Tanzanian schools have to give – a beautiful environment with the animals which every kid (and adult) dreams about seeing; young people who are eloquent and passionate; a notion of ‘family’ which goes far beyond 2.4 children and TV dinners and an innate knowledge that we are here on this earth to help each other, learn from each other and make it a better place. But today I realised the most important thing that Tanzanian schools have to give,  as stated simply by Pendo, one of the staff  "perhaps the UK school needs friendship.”