NGO WORK
Call to Sever Ties with Tanzanian Government Over Latest Human Rights Abuses Against the Maasai
Open Letter from the Oakland Institute and Survival International to UNESCO WHC & IUCN
To: Lazare Eloundou Assomo, Director UNESCO World Heritage
CC: Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO Director General
Tim Badman, Director, IUCN World Heritage Program
Muhammad Juma, Chief of Africa Unit, UNESCO World Heritage
ICOMOS Secretariat
Subject: Call to Sever Ties with Tanzanian Government Over Latest Human Rights Abuses Against the Maasai
Dear Director Lazare Eloundou Assomo,
We are writing in light of the latest violence unleashed on the Maasai communities living in the Loliondo division of Ngorongoro district by the Tanzanian security forces. On June 8, 2022, the Tanzanian government initiated the demarcation of 1,500 km2 of land that it intends to turn into a game reserve, which would trigger mass evictions of Maasai living in legally registered villages within Loliondo. This action has led to widespread violence against the Maasai by security forces, which has left at least 31 people wounded by live ammunition and other injuries while one police officer was allegedly killed by an arrow. A total of twenty-three citizens (including 9 ward councilors) have been arraigned before the Resident Magistrate’s Court of Arusha and charged with the murder of the policeman.
Injured Maasai, including high numbers of women and children, have fled to Kenya to seek medical treatment and the government continues to crack down on those who are attempting to share information regarding the violence. Despite this resistance from local communities living on this land, Prime Minister Majaliwa announced the demarcation exercise had been completed.
This latest travesty is a continuation of past efforts to evict Maasai from their ancestral lands in Loliondo for safari tourism and trophy hunting. The United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based Otterlo Business Company (OBC) — which runs hunting excursions for the country’s royal family and their guests — will reportedly control commercial hunting in the area despite the company’s past involvement in several violent evictions of the Maasai, including in 2017, burning of homes, and the killing of thousands of rare animals in the area.
There has been extensive condemnation of this violence and forced evictions of the Maasai by numerous organizations and coalitions. On June 13, 2022, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights strongly condemned(link is external) the violence and urged the government to halt the eviction and open an independent investigation. On June 14, the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues expressed(link is external) “its profound concern” over the ongoing evictions” and called “on the government of Tanzania to comply with the provisions recognized in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and other relevant international human rights instruments, and ensure the right of the Maasai to participate in decision-making, considering that their land in Loliondo for safari tourism, trophy hunting and “conservation” will affect their lives and territory.”
On June 15, nine United Nations Special Rapporteurs called(link is external) on the Tanzanian government to “immediately halt plans for relocation of the people living in Loliondo and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and begin consultations with the Maasai Indigenous Peoples, including direct contact with the Ngorongoro Pastoral Council, to jointly define current challenges to environmental conservation and best avenues to resolve them, while maintaining a human rights-based approach to conservation.” Finally, on June 19, IUCN issued a statement(link is external) on the human rights violations in Loliondo, sharing that it was “deeply concerned.”
Given these developments are occurring alongside the threat of eviction faced by tens of thousands of Indigenous residents of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, the government’s shocking display of violence against its own citizens and patently false denial of responsibility cannot be ignored. We have previously written to your office warning of plans to evict Maasai from the NCA and the inadequacy of relocation sites. These latest rights violations in Loliondo demonstrate that the government does not hesitate to resort to violence, in violation of its national and international obligations, towards the realization of its plans.
The government’s blatant disregard for Indigenous lives and international human rights law calls for immediate and decisive action from the UNESCO WHC and IUCN. Continued inaction on your part makes you complicit. The UNESCO WHC has failed to ensure respect for the rights of Indigenous residents. Therefore, Ngorongoro should be delisted as a World Heritage Site and all ties between the UNESCO WHC and IUCN with the government should be immediately severed.
Sincerely,
Anuradha Mittal
Executive Director
The Oakland Institute
Fiore Longo
Director, France & Spain
Survival International
Open Letter to UNESCO WHC & IUCN June 24, 2022Related posts:
URGENT ALERT – Heavy Police Presence in Loliondo as Threats of Mass Evictions of the Maasai Intensify
Justice Denied: East African Court of Justice Grants Tanzanian Government Impunity to Trample Human Rights of the Maasai
Tanzanian Government Continues Violent Repression of the Maasai in Loliondo Despite Worldwide Condemnation
Tanzanian Government’s Sustained Campaign Against the Maasai in Loliondo and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area
Oakland, CA – As the World Bank convenes its Annual Meetings in Thailand this week, the accountability of the institution is entirely omitted from the agenda. Yet, its lack of accountability to the millions of people displaced or harmed by its programs around the world has never been more appalling.
The Bank claims that recent 2026 reforms would strengthen its accountability mechanism, but the facts show a total disregard for the devastation it has caused. In Tanzania, it has failed to act on damning findings from its own Inspection Panel – whose investigation detailed systemic violations of its own Operating Procedures and a “critical failure” in project planning and supervision, leaving local villagers to continue bearing the brunt of harsh, unmitigated serious harms.
Between 2017-2024, the World Bank poured over US$100 million into REGROW, doubling the size of Ruaha National Park in Southern Tanzania and funding the paramilitary park rangers (TANAPA) implicated in egregious human rights abuses – including killings and forced disappearances. Following an independent investigation, the project was officially cancelled.
“The park expansion effectively criminalized over 84,000 people on their own land, stripping them of their livelihoods by barring essential farming and grazing. The Bank’s REGROW initiative turned poor villagers into targets for park rangers. Despite clear evidence that the devastation it unleashed continues today, the Bank has completely failed to provide redress, compensate or support the communities whose lives it upended,” said Anuradha Mittal, Executive Director of the Oakland Institute, who represented villagers in their complaint to the Inspection panel.
In April 2025, ignoring community demands for reparations and the return of land, the Board approved a largely insufficient and inadequate Management Action Plan (MAP). On September 4, 2026, the Bank officially “closed” the REGROW case after deeming all actions in the MAP had been completed.
“The World Bank has destroyed our lives. Since the project started, rangers have killed or disappeared 18 of us. We are banned from farming our lands and grazing our livestock. Thousands of our cattle were confiscated. We are still waiting for justice and reparations for our losses. How can the World Bank walk away after being found responsible for this catastrophe?” said a local villager who filed the initial complaint.
Today, despite the Bank’s assertions that livelihoods could resume, many farmers remain barred from their fields, and pastoralists face continuous threats and fines for grazing cattle. The international spotlight that the Institute put on the dire situation has brought a halt to fatal shootings by TANAPA rangers since May 2025 – a grim baseline for “progress” from a paramilitary force that has terrorized communities since the Bank bolstered their capacity. The families of those murdered by TANAPA, including 27-year-old Hamprey Mhaki and 20-year-old Kulwa Igembe, continue to be denied justice.
“The Inspection Panel presented undeniable evidence of the Bank’s wrongdoings, yet the Bank’s Board and senior management refused to take responsibility. Affected communities took monumental personal and collective risks to expose these abuses, offering the Bank every opportunity to correct course. Instead, management turned its back on the very people it harmed – leaving a permanent stain on the institution’s credibility. The Oakland Institute will continue to stand with communities in their fight for justice,” concluded Mittal.
The World Bank’s expanding accountability crisis is further deepened by its decision to join the Trump-established Board of Peace (BoP) for Gaza, proactively enabling impunity for crimes against humanity and genocide. By joining the BoP, the Bank directly violates its own mandate and policies, international humanitarian law and decades of UN General Assembly Resolutions. Furthermore, the move defies provisional orders and advisory opinions from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and rulings from the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Source: oaklandinstitute.org
Related posts:
World Bank Fails to Remedy Harms it Caused in Tanzania, Despite a Scathing Investigation by its Inspection Panel
Communities Under Siege: New Report Reveals World Bank Failures in Safeguard Compliance and Human Rights Oversight in Tanzania
The World Bank Must Be Held Accountable for Harm Inflicted on Tanzanian Communities by Tourism Project
Campaign Victory: World Bank Suspends Funding for REGROW, a Conservation Project Responsible for Evictions & Human Rights Abuses in Tanzania
NGO WORK
Tanzanian Government Abducts Maasai Villagers in an Unconscionable Attack on Indigenous Land Defenders
- Human rights conditions in northern Tanzania have deteriorated sharply since August, as the Tanzanian government carries out a coordinated campaign of violence and arrests against the Indigenous Maasai.
- In Ngorongoro, five Maasai were arrested last week; Over 30 community members have been arrested over the last two months; In neighboring Loliondo, thousands of livestock have been confiscated.
- The government is pressuring Maasai to leave the area to reach its goal of expanding the number of safari tourists and trophy hunters to eight million by 2030.
- The last arbitrary arrests unfolded in Arusha as Tanzania hosted the 153rd Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, centered on the theme of “enhancing good governance and empowering communities through inclusivity, trust and opportunities for all.”
Oakland, CA – On the night of October 6, the Tanzanian government forcefully abducted five Maasai men, Nangei Meitaya, Salangat Makko, Ezekiel Kishau, Dickson and Thadeus Clamian, holding them under arbitrary detention at the Arusha Central Police Station. While the individuals were released the following night, these targeted arrests are a dangerous escalation in the government’s systemic oppression of the Indigenous Maasai people.
Since August, human rights conditions in northern Tanzania have worsened sharply as the state carries out a wave of coordinated violence and arrests against the Maasai. In the Ngorongoro Division, authorities have detained more than 30 community members, while confiscations of livestock have intensified in neighboring Loliondo. Local advocates state these actions are part of a systemic campaign to suppress peaceful dissent and dismantle civil society, through economic restrictions, intimidation, and unlawful incarceration of Maasai pastoralists.
“Far from being an isolated incident, this is a calculated campaign of intimidation. Driven by its goal to attract eight million safari tourists by 2030, the Tanzanian government is escalating pressure to evict the Maasai from their ancestral lands. As a result, community leaders have been driven into hiding once again, describing a rapidly deteriorating situation across the region,” said Anuradha Mittal, Executive Director of the Oakland Institute.
While detained, the victims were deprived access to their families or legal counsel. Four of those arrested are employees of the Pastoral Women’s Council (PWC), a local NGO dedicated to the “sustainable empowerment of Indigenous pastoralist women and girls in northern Tanzania.” Furthermore, authorities searched the homes of other staff members without due process.
“The abduction and subsequent detention of our community members is one of the many incidents of lawless targeting of the Maasai people in Ngorongoro – a deliberate campaign to instill fear and censorship, designed to make state dispossession and displacement easy. When a regime normalizes abductions and uses public hospitals as hunting grounds, it reveals a complete breakdown of common sense and basic humanity,” said Joseph Moses Oleshangay, a prominent Maasai human rights lawyer and activist from the Ngorongoro District in Tanzania.
The arbitrary arrests unfolded in Arusha as Tanzania hosted the 153rd Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, centered on the theme of “enhancing good governance and empowering communities through inclusivity, trust and opportunities for all.” This international gathering of parliamentarians from around the world comes a year after the rigged October 2025 national elections, during which the security forces violently suppressed pro-democracy demonstrations and killed thousands of civilians. Meanwhile, in March 2026, President Hassan accepted recommendations from sham land commissions advocating for the widespread eviction of Maasai communities from their ancestral lands in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA) and Loliondo.
The government plans to drastically reduce Maasai presence in the NCA to expand safari tourism and trophy hunting. To pressure residents to leave, the government has stopped basic medical, education, and water services while restricting access to grazing land for pastoralists. Massive mobilizations by the Maasai against this forced resettlement have exposed the government’s lie that people are leaving willingly.
“As international visitors plan safari tours to Tanzania, they must recognize that tourism revenues are inadvertently financing the government’s violent attack on Maasai communities whose ancestral lands are being stolen in plain sight,” concluded Mittal.
Source: oaklandinstitute.org
Related posts:
Tanzanian Government Continues Violent Repression of the Maasai in Loliondo Despite Worldwide Condemnation
Justice Denied: East African Court of Justice Grants Tanzanian Government Impunity to Trample Human Rights of the Maasai
Tanzanian Government’s Sustained Campaign Against the Maasai in Loliondo and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area
Call to Sever Ties with Tanzanian Government Over Latest Human Rights Abuses Against the Maasai
Related posts:
The Great “Green” Heist: When Artificial Intelligence and Arms Dealers Seize the Minerals of the South
Human rights defenders & business in 2022: People challenging corporate power to protect our planet.
U.S. Peace Efforts in the DRC: Protecting Communities or Minerals?
Peruvian communities have launched a global petition to halt a mining project they say threatens the water supply of over 10 million people.
Standard Bank faces complaint over sustainability claims linked to East African Oil Pipeline
StopEACOP Coalition demands disclosure of US$3.7 billion in pipeline financing
From grassroots action to policy transformation: How local environmental solutions spark enduring change.
A coalition of 625 African faith leaders will gather, united in their call for reparations in response to what they describe as the failure of a Gates-backed agricultural model.
Tanzanian Government Abducts Maasai Villagers in an Unconscionable Attack on Indigenous Land Defenders
World Food Day 2026: Building healthy diets means reimagining how we grow, share, and enjoy our food.
The global race for clean energy minerals is leaving communities grappling with conflicts and human rights abuses, a new report reveals.
Environmental and human rights advocates are urging the world to hold global investors accountable for their actions.
Innovative Finance from Canada projects positive impact on local communities.
Over 5000 Indigenous Communities evicted in Kiryandongo District
Petition To Land Inquiry Commission Over Human Rights In Kiryandongo District
Invisible victims of Uganda Land Grabs
-
MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK2 weeks agoWorld Food Day 2026: Building healthy diets means reimagining how we grow, share, and enjoy our food.
-
MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK1 week agoEnvironmental and human rights advocates are urging the world to hold global investors accountable for their actions.
-
NGO WORK2 weeks agoAs World Bank Holds Annual Meetings, 84,000 Tanzanians Call for Justice
-
MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK2 weeks agoInternational Day of Rural Women : Rural women farmers deserve not only equal rights and access to resources, but also the strength and voice to safeguard Mother Nature.
-
FARM NEWS2 weeks agoTeso farmers revamp grapefruit growing
-
MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK1 week agoWhy are secure land rights key to Africa’s climate resilience and the protection of its natural treasures?
-
MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK3 days agoA coalition of 625 African faith leaders will gather, united in their call for reparations in response to what they describe as the failure of a Gates-backed agricultural model.
-
MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK4 days agoHigh land title costs, bureaucracy, and distance leave women struggling to secure land rights in Africa.