February 27, 2022

THIS WEEK IN HUMAN RIGHTS NEWS

In Tanzania, Maasai people continue to resist eviction from ancestral lands

Sources: Mongabay, Oakland Institute, Anadolu Agency

*This segment is a follow up from a previous story covered in September 2021

In Tanzania’s Ngorongoro Wildlife Park, indigenous Maasai people continue to resist eviction from the government. 

In February, Mongabay reported that ‘more than 70,000 indigenous Maasai residents are facing eviction from ancestral lands’ due to the Tanzanian government’s decision to lease the land to a company based in the United Arab Emirates. 

The company, a hunting firm, intends to use the area for ‘trophy hunting’ and ‘elite tourism’. According to Mongabay, this is not the first time the company has contributed to the eviction of Maasai people, in addition to the ‘killing of thousands of rare animals in the area’.

Following the government’s decision, Oakland Institute reported that more than 700 Maasai people gathered in Oloirobi Village to pray against eviction. Oakland Institute also reported that the Tanzanian Parliament has ‘discussed the use of military [force] to forcibly evict those Maasai unwilling to leave’.

The demonstration also comes after thousands of Maasai cattle herders protested against eviction in late January. 

“We were evicted from Serengeti National Park in 1959,” Raphael Long’oi, a Maasai leader, told Anadolu Agency, who reported on the movement. “Today, we’re being asked to move from Loliondo. We won’t leave.”