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Sham Presidential Commissions Rubber Stamp Tanzanian Government’s Efforts to Evict Indigenous Maasai from Ngorongoro Conservation Area

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5 months ago

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  • March 12, 2026, Presidential commissions’ reports recommend dismantling longstanding Maasai rights in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA) – rubber-stamping the Tanzanian government’s plans for widespread evictions to expand tourism.
  • President Hassan pursues a so-called “voluntary” relocation program, despite extensive evidence that communities are being forced to leave through the withdrawal of essential services and livelihood restrictions.
  • The government announced a crackdown on civil society groups critical of its plans, raising concerns of further repression of land defenders and NGOs speaking out against forced displacement.
  • Maasai communities remain steadfast in the defense of their land, livelihoods, and way of life, vowing to continue resistance against attempts to force them from their ancestral territories.

Oakland, CA – In reports submitted on March 12, 2026 to Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan, commissions tasked to assess land disputes in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA) and review resettlement plans, dismissed rights of the Indigenous Maasai to their ancestral lands. They instead advance recommendations that further marginalize their rights in order to expand safari tourism.

“The commissions’ recommendations are based on outright lies about the environmental impacts of the Maasai, while completely ignoring the real damage caused by rapid tourism expansion,” said a Maasai elder. 1 “If these extremely biased and reckless recommendations are implemented, it will be the end of our people in Ngorongoro.”

Immediately after the reports were submitted, park rangers started harassment of residents in the grazing areas of Ndutu with the intent to force them to leave for tourism expansion. Three community members were reportedly beaten and arrested while others received notices to vacate.

Recommendations are a crafty attempt at changing 1959 legislation that created the NCA as a multiple land use area – explicitly enshrining the right of the Maasai to live and graze cattle in the area. The Maasai were promised that “should there be any conflict between the interests of the game [animals] and the human inhabitants, those of the latter must take precedence.”

The President has accepted the recommendations and stated she “will act on them” – a decision that will have a catastrophic impact on Maasai communities. The government has signaled its intention to drastically reduce Maasai presence in the NCA and relocate what it calls “non-conservation activities” outside the area. Towards this goal, the President has indicated an expansion of the “voluntary” relocation program.

For years, the Oakland Institute has shattered government myths about “voluntary” resettlement –exposing serious flaws with relocation plans that are being forced upon communities. 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 expose the government’s lie that people are leaving willingly.

Beyond the NCA, the commissions also recommend further restrictions on livelihoods, threatening the future eviction of Maasai communities living near Lake Natron and Loliondo. “These sham findings are the latest attempt by the government to rapidly expand its brutal fortress conservation model across the country, threatening hundreds of thousands of Indigenous lives in blind pursuit of tourism dollars that have failed to trickle down to improve the lives of the poor Tanzanians and the local communities,” said Anuradha Mittal, Executive Director of the Oakland Institute.

In another alarming development, the government is attempting to silence local NGOs by reviewing their registration status and monitoring their activities to force them to operate “in alignment with national conservation objectives.” The move reflects the regime’s ongoing persecution of civil society and broader crackdown on dissent, carried out through state violence and arbitrary detention. Major opposition parties remain outlawed in Tanzania, while government critics have routinely disappeared. Following the rigged October 2025 national elections, the government violently suppressed pro-democracy protests and state security forces killed thousands of civilians.

As previously warned by the Oakland Institute, both commissions lacked independence given they were dominated by government personnel and had very limited Maasai representation. The commissions’ reports – which have not been made public – were orally presented to the government nearly one year after they were due to provide findings.

“These commissions have no credibility. From the start, they were tasked with rubber stamping the government’s plans to evict the Indigenous Maasai so their land can be a safari and hunting playground for the rich foreign tourists. One cannot be fooled by their “findings” and international solidarity must be mobilized to uphold Maasai’s rights to their ancestral land,” warned Mittal.

Source: oaklandinstitute.org

Related posts:

The Oakland Institute Calls on the Tanzanian Presidential Land Commissions to Respect & Ensure Rights of Maasai Living in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Tanzanian Government’s Sustained Campaign Against the Maasai in Loliondo and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area URGENT ALERT: Tanzanian Government on a Rampage Against Indigenous People Tanzanian Government Continues Violent Repression of the Maasai in Loliondo Despite Worldwide Condemnation Call to Sever Ties with Tanzanian Government Over Latest Human Rights Abuses Against the Maasai

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The Great “Green” Heist: When Artificial Intelligence and Arms Dealers Seize the Minerals of the South

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1 week ago

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August 4, 2026

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By Franck Zongwe Lukama, Congolese journalist and researcher, leads the independent media KilaloPress in DRC.

We were sold a simple equation: to save the planet, we must dig. Dig faster, deeper, extracting from the earth the cobalt, lithium, or copper needed for solar panels and electric vehicles. Yet, this climate rescue rhetoric conceals a staggering statistical deception. Today, 70% of global demand for critical minerals does absolutely nothing to support the energy transition. These resources end up in aerospace, communication technologies, and, above all, weaponry. Sectors that, ironically, exacerbate the global ecological crisis. The green revolution has become the perfect smokescreen, the moral veneer for a very different kind of war.

Far from the promises of sustainable development touted by the World Bank, the current scramble is driven by a strict logic of geopolitical power. A damning report from the California-based Oakland Institute exposes this global scheme. The report reveals an unprecedented and formidable convergence of interests between the American military-industrial complex and the giants of Silicon Valley. With the Pentagon openly pivoting toward a combat strategy focused on artificial intelligence (AI), securing supply chains is no longer a matter of ecology, but a question of survival in the face of Chinese influence. The United States is not seeking to reduce carbon emissions; it is seeking to guarantee its technological and military supremacy.

Artisanal Coltan - manganese - cobalt mining in Mudere mine under control of Nyatura militia, town of Rubaya, North Kivu region (Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa). Photo: Erberto Zani.

The real winners of this frantic race wear suits far removed from environmental activism. Trillions of dollars are flowing into new alliances that intertwine AI-driven mining companies, like KoBold Metals—backed by billionaires such as Bill Gates—and companies specializing in cutting-edge defense technologies, like Palantir and Anduril, not to mention the networks of influence close to the Trump family. For these players, the discourse of climate emergency acts as a powerful public relations tool. It justifies massive and accelerated extraction that would otherwise provoke international outrage.

Local communities and Indigenous populations find themselves on the frontlines, forced to resist an extraction machine that has the audacity to justify their suffering by claiming it is necessary to save the world.

And the price of this hypocrisy is being paid in full throughout the Global South. In the Rubaya hills, in the Kolwezi copper belt, as in the Indigenous territories of Latin America and Asia, the promise of “prosperity” translates into a terrifyingly familiar tragedy. Land grabbing, forced displacement, devastating groundwater pollution: the plundering of ecosystems and human lives is accelerating. Local communities and Indigenous populations find themselves on the frontlines, forced to resist an extraction machine that has the audacity to justify their suffering by claiming it is necessary to save the world. Today, opposing the destruction of one’s village by a multinational mining company risks being accused of hindering the fight against climate change. The rhetorical trap is devastatingly effective.

Artisanal Coltan - manganese - cobalt mining in Mudere mine under control of Nyatura militia, town of Rubaya, North Kivu region (Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa). Photo: Erberto Zani.

The long-term consequences of this diversion are alarming. The exponential surge in demand generated by future AI data centers, mass surveillance, and global rearmament will mathematically deplete available reserves. Every ton of copper, nickel, or cobalt consumed by combat drones or algorithmic data processing servers is a ton diverted from the production of renewable energy infrastructure. We are not equipping the energy transition; we are cannibalizing it to militarize our future.

We are not equipping the energy transition; we are cannibalizing it to militarize our future.

If no strict regulations are put in place to curb this rampant mining frenzy, hundreds of new mines will spring up in the coming years, causing irreversible damage on an unprecedented scale. The question facing citizens today, from Kinshasa to Washington, is no longer whether we will have enough minerals to save our atmosphere. It is why we are willing to sacrifice millions of lives and destroy our lands to fuel next-generation algorithms and weapons. In ten years, when the Global South is nothing more than a vast crater serving a militarized hyper-technology, it will be too late to realize that the planet was never the priority.

Photos: Artisanal Coltan – manganese – cobalt mining in Mudere mine under control of Nyatura militia, town of Rubaya, North Kivu region (Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa). Erberto Zani – stock.adobe.com

Source: oaklandinstitute.org/

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Rush: Global Scramble for Minerals Wages War on People and Planet Experts warn that without Africa’s control over resources and climate financing, the continent faces the risk of entering a new era of “green colonialism”. 30 civil society organizations have written to the World Bank Group demanding to publicly disclose the Africa Energy Approach paper. Africa Climate Summit 2023 Set to Surrender the Continent to Green Colonialism The mothers and daughters of the global south cannot celebrate the World Bank’s 80-year legacy of harm.
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NGO WORK

EU: IPI welcomes action against 14 states over Anti-SLAPP Directive delays

Published

3 weeks ago

on

July 27, 2026

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EU states must introduce robust measures to protect journalists and media from vexatious litigation

The International Press Institute (IPI) today welcomes the infringement proceedings initiated by the European Commission against 14 EU Member States over their inaction or delays in transposing the Anti-SLAPP Directive.

The countries included are Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia and Spain.

The EU infringement proceedings were initiated on 15 July, with letters of formal notice sent to these Member States for failing to notify about progress made in implementing the Directive. States now have two months to respond and update about measures taken or could eventually face legal action at the European Court of Justice.

The Anti-SLAPP Directive introduced EU-wide rules which protect journalists and civil society actors from manifestly unfounded or abusive civil proceedings with cross-border implications, including early dismissal tools and remedies for targets of SLAPPs. It was adopted in April 2024 and the transposition deadline was 7 May 2026.

Monitoring by IPI shows that while in some of the countries identified, such as Greece and Spain, steps have been taken to prepare for the transposition and bills are actively in development and reportedly close to being presented to or adopted by parliament.

In others such as Bulgaria and Portugal, initial work done to develop legislation has been delayed by institutional changes, changes in governments or political instability, though transposition work remains ongoing.

In other states, such as Italy and Hungary, little to no measurable progress has yet been made on transposition. However, with the new Tisza government in Hungary driving forward media freedom reforms, there is hope the new administration will introduce initial anti-SLAPP measures in the next legislative package identified for the autumn.

While Ireland has been actively working to tackle SLAPPs through legal reforms, and passed the Defamation Bill in 2024, further legislation is required to fully transpose the Anti-SLAPP Directive during its Presidency of the Council of the EU.

Although these 14 countries have been identified in the EU action, monitoring and analyses show that the overall picture for implementation of the Directive across the EU remains fragmented and uneven.

According to the European Anti-SLAPP Monitor, almost all EU Member States missed the May 2026 transposition deadline, with only a handful fully implementing on time.

IPI notes that even in those Member States where the Directive was implemented, such as Malta, these reforms only included minimum standards protecting against cross-border cases, and failed to include measures to safeguard against domestic SLAPPs.

In the wake of the EU’s opening of initial infringement action, IPI renews our call – made previously with Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) partners – for Member States to demonstrate their commitment to media freedom by accelerating their legislative processes in protecting against SLAPPs. This includes the 14 countries identified by the EU Commission and those in which reforms have been presented but not yet adopted.

Crucially, legislative reforms should both fully reflect both the letter and the spirit of the Anti-SLAPP Directive and introduce the substantive and procedural safeguards set out in the EU and Council of Europe Recommendation on SLAPPs.

A model here should be Poland, where last month the President approved a law which covers both domestic and cross-border SLAPPs, ensuring implementation of both EU Directive and Council of Europe Recommendation.

Member States which continue to delay or fail to transpose the directive should face legal action from the Commission, which must use all tools at its disposal to help safeguard media freedom across the bloc.

IPI, which has advocated at the EU and national level for measures to protect journalists and media from SLAPPs, will continue to monitor implementation in collaboration with European partners, including through MFRR media freedom missions.

Source: ipi.media/

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NGO WORK

No Heritage Without its People: Why Ngorongoro Cannot be a World Heritage Site and an Eviction Zone

Published

4 weeks ago

on

July 20, 2026

By

The Tanzanian government, under the guise of “conservation,” restricts Maasai livelihoods and denies access to essential services forcing Indigenous residents away from their ancestral lands and turning their heritage into a playground for safari tourists.

As the 48th Session of the World Heritage Committee begins July 19, UNESCO continues to legitimize the continued forced displacement of the Maasai from Ngorongoro. If UNESCO cannot ensure that the World Heritage designation protects the rights of its Indigenous custodians, then the Committee must remove the Ngorongoro Conservation Area from the World Heritage List.

Increased international pressure is imperative to hold UNESCO accountable and protect the lives and rights of the Maasai!

Read our Open Letter to the World Heritage Committee.

Source: oaklandinstitute.org

Related posts:

President Hassan receives a report from the presidential commissions at an official handover ceremony, March 2026.
Tanzania: Commissions call for mass eviction of Indigenous Maasai from world-famous tourist destinations. Maasai protest evictions from Ngorongoro as UN experts warn conservation must respect rights The Oakland Institute Calls on the Tanzanian Presidential Land Commissions to Respect & Ensure Rights of Maasai Living in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Tanzanian Government’s Sustained Campaign Against the Maasai in Loliondo and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Sham Presidential Commissions Rubber Stamp Tanzanian Government’s Efforts to Evict Indigenous Maasai from Ngorongoro Conservation Area
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