Survival International, Maasai body hail announcement; say it sends strong message
The European Commission (EC) has removed Tanzania from the list of countries eligible for its 18 million Euro conservation grant to be launched in East Africa as part of its NaturAfrica initiative.
‘CORRIGENDUM NO 4’ uploaded under the section ‘EU Funding & Tenders Portal’ on the EC portal as on June 5, 2024, notes that, “This call for proposals is targeting the Eastern Rift Savannahs and Watersheds (ERiSaWa) component of NaturAfrica, and more particularly two KLCDs of high biodiversity importance, which offer sustainable socio-economic opportunities to local communities and require good governance to continue providing critical ecosystem services.”
‘KLCD’ is short for Key Landscapes for Conservation and Development.
The document continues: “The two KLCDs are: 1) the SOKNOT (Southern Kenya Northern Tanzania) ecosystem, within which this Call will include only activities in Southern Kenya (Lot 1) and Northern Kenya ecosystem (Lot 2).”
According to statements by the Maasai International Solidarity Alliance (MISA) and Survival International, the EC removed Tanzania from the list on World Environment Day (June 5), in response to the Tanzanian government’s recent series of harsh evictions to remove the Maasai people.
The semi-nomadic pastoralist group has been targeted by the government in order to remove them from their traditional lands in and around Loliondo in the iconic Ngorongoro Conservation Area, a UNESCO World Heritage site in the northern part of the country.
Survival International is a human rights organisation that campaigns for the rights of Indigenous and/or tribal peoples and uncontacted peoples.
MISA is an international alliance standing in solidarity with the Maasai of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and Loliondo.
“This decision sends a strong message, as it comes after the World Bank decision to suspend its funding for a big conservation project in April 2024 and the German Development Cooperation halted its projects in Loliondo in the second half of 2023,” the MISA statement read.
The Tanzanian Government has been systematically targeting Maasai communities, using conservation and tourism development as a pretext to evict people from their lands, it claimed.
MISA had expressed concerns to the EC last month about its Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainable Community Livelihoods: Eastern Rift Savannahs and Watersheds (ERiSaWa) call for proposals, because of the impossibility of guaranteeing the implementation of a human-rights based approach (HRBA) in the current Tanzanian context.
“The corrigendum in the call for proposals published by the EC is a clear sign that the EU acknowledges the negative impacts of exclusive conservation on Maasai rights and on pastoralism as a livelihood and a highly valuable land-management system in the context of the climate crisis,” it noted.
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