NGO WORK
Tanzanian Government Continues Violent Repression of the Maasai in Loliondo Despite Worldwide Condemnation
Beacon placed adjacent to bomas, disproving government claims the demarcated land is not near occupied villages.
In the past two weeks, the Tanzanian government has escalated its campaign against the Maasai living within the Loliondo division of Ngorongoro district. Arbitrary arrests have continued — on June 29, 2022 ten people from Ndinyika, Malambo and seven more in Serng’etuny, Piyaya were arrested. 30 people were arrested in Njoroi and 11 arrested in Oloika sub-village under the pretense of being “illegal Kenyan immigrants” on July 2, 2022. Later that day, six seasonal bomas were burned to the ground in the Oldoinyorok area of Arash. On July 6, six more people — including a primary school teacher — were arrested in Olosirwa.
In addition to these widespread arrests, Tanzanian security forces have seized cattle en masse from the Maasai. Approximately 477 cows and 650 sheep were seized in Ololosokwan on July 2, 2022 and just two days later, more cattle and sheep from over five bomas in Ildupa sub-village of Ormanie were taken. To reclaim their animals, Maasai are reportedly being extorted for 100,000 TShs per cow [~US$42] and 25,000 TShs [~$US11] per sheep, a price too high for most to pay.
“The recent arrests and cattle seizures demonstrate that despite widespread international condemnation, the government of President Samia Suluhu Hassan is moving forward with the disastrous and illegal plan of removing Maasai from their ancestral land,” said Anuradha Mittal, Executive Director of the Oakland Institute.
This repression follows the violence that erupted on June 8, 2022 after the Tanzanian government initiated the demarcation of 1,500 km2 of land it intends to turn into a game reserve for trophy hunting by the United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based Otterlo Business Company (OBC). In response, communities gathered to protest the demarcation. Security forces violently retaliated, severely wounding 18 men and 13 women. One elderly man was reportedly killed after being struck by a security forces vehicle. Thousands reportedly fled to Kenya for their safety and one injured elderly Maasai man who was injured remains missing.
An arrow allegedly killed one police officer during the demarcation violence and over 20 people — including ten ward councilors — have been arraigned before the Resident Magistrate’s Court of Arusha and charged with the murder of the policeman. Simon Saitoti — councilor for the Ngorongoro ward – was the latest to be arrested on July 1, 2022 after visiting those already detained.
International condemnation of the government’s violence was swift and widespread. The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, nine United Nations Special Rapporteurs and numerous international human rights groups issued statements against the violence. In the face of mounting calls to halt evictions and investigate the human rights abuses, the government has instead completed the demarcation process for the newly named “Pololeti Game Controlled Area,” and some villagers have started to leave the area. The Ministry of Tourism and Natural Resources has indicated the area will later become a game reserve, triggering mass evictions of Maasai living in legally registered villages.
Removing residents from this area violates the 2018 East African Court of Justice (EACJ) injunction, which prohibited the Tanzanian government from evicting the villagers, seizing their livestock, destroying property, or engaging in harassment against Maasai communities living in Ololosokwan, Oloirien, Kirtalo, and Arash villages. While a ruling was expected on June 22, in a surprising move, the court postponed the decision until September 2022.
“People of Irkeepusi village in Ngorongoro district praying to God, their only refuge, as the government moves forward with eviction plans.”
“Despite courageously speaking out and seeking international intervention, communities have been continually ignored by the government. Today they are left with little recourse except to pray for their continued survival,” Mittal added. The Oakland Institute and Survival International have called on the UNESCO World Heritage Centre to immediately sever ties with the Tanzanian government over the latest abuses and delist the nearby Ngorongoro Conservation Area as a World Heritage Site given the government’s disregard for Indigenous lives and rights. The communities have appealed to Tanzania’s donor countries to apply pressure.
“It is beyond time for international conservation agencies and donor governments to do more than issue statements. It is time for real action to show the Tanzanian government that the international community will not sit back and watch this disregard for the role of law while the lives and future of the Maasai is imperiled,” Mittal concluded.
Source: oaklandinstitute.org
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NGO WORK
The Great “Green” Heist: When Artificial Intelligence and Arms Dealers Seize the Minerals of the South
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.
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.
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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NGO WORK
No Heritage Without its People: Why Ngorongoro Cannot be a World Heritage Site and an Eviction Zone
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:
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The Oakland Institute Calls on the Tanzanian Presidential Land Commissions to Respect & Ensure Rights of Maasai Living in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area
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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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