Amos Leuka and Sarah Tenoi are Loita Maasais, an indigenous, nomadic, pastoralist community based in the Loita Hills in Narok county, Kenya. Although Loita culture is inherently adaptive, thanks to its mobility and communal land ownership structures, climate change, poverty and political marginalisation are rendering the traditional lifestyle unsustainable.
That marginalisation is being worsened by Kenya’s central government imposing ‘demarcation’ as the solution to climate-induced poverty, lack of access to services and declining agricultural production. Demarcation is a process that allocates bounded plots of land to people and individualises land ownership. It threatens to restrict Loitan mobility and culture and risks displacing them from their ancestral lands.
Amos and Sarah are working to understand demarcation and the effects it will have on the community. Amos is the former Project Manager of SAFE Maa, an organisation addressing HIV and Female Genital Mutilation/ Cutting (FGM/C), and is now on the Loita Land Committee board. Sarah, SAFE Maa Project Manager, is a resident of Ilkerin – the first area in Loita to be demarcated. Their battle to defend Loita rights has been challenging on multiple fronts, while revealing tensions between protecting cultural traditions and securing gender justice.
Colonialism and displacement
Demarcation processes are situated within Kenya’s long history of land dispute and resource conflict. Loita Maasais are one of the 22 Maasai sub-clans. They derived their name from their home in the Loita Hills – 300km2 of indigenous forest in the Rift Valley, bordering Tanzania. Prior to the colonial era, Maasai communities moved freely with their livestock to find pasture and water across current international borders.
In 1904 and 1911, Maasai elders signed treaties with colonial authorities that moved them into reserves. There, they faced taxation and control under the British East African Protectorate while the government bounded land for white settlers and conservation in the fertile lands of the Rift Valley.
Over time, the establishment of national borders, encroachment from other displaced groups, and competition for land among differing clans have resulted in Maasais losing 50-70 per cent of their land – and with it their mobile way of life.
The establishment of national borders, encroachment from displaced groups, and competition for land have resulted in Maasais losing 50-70 per cent of their land
Following independence, in 1963, the Kenyan government introduced community-run group ranches, designed to help ensure the survival of Maasai culture, while controlling land allocation and use. Community elders – who are exclusively men – execute decisions on these ranches, governed under Community Land tenure systems, while the government regulates public land.
With reduced access to land, communities settled into homesteads – herding livestock around a defined area. Access to services improved, but new challenges arose: loss of tradition and culture, natural resource degradation, reduced economic potential and conflict over resources and with wildlife.
Government pressures
In June 2024, Kenya’s President Ruto’s proposed Finance Bill revealed the latest iteration of land and resource disputes. Despite being revoked following nation-wide protests, there is ongoing unrest concerning elements of the Bill related to indigenous land rights. While demarcation is framed by politicians as necessary to combat climatic and economic challenges, it aggravates the issues it claims to correct.
The Bill proposed increased complexity of land ownership – especially for Loitans. The government is trying to reduce freehold land tenures, instead establishing newly defined plots as ‘leasehold land’.
Amos notes that these changes ‘pressure every Kenyan’. Explaining the context, he stated, ‘we feel the impact of the cost of living. We are less privileged in terms of government services, because we are an underserved community and we faced serious calamities during the last rains.
‘There are issues of land in that Finance Bill that put a lot of fear (…) because we intend to have our land as freeholds but the government is pushing for leaseholds. We are concerned about community land, because this includes the forest, the cultural sites, and other areas set aside for communal issues. These spaces are threatened by the Bill which would affect the land, livestock and our livelihoods.’
Each land tenure system entails different tax rates and land levies, where failure to comply results in the government repossessing the territory. In the current context, this additional tax is unaffordable for many, directly leading to government grabs and displacing communities. Sarah explains, ‘if we lose the land, we will lose our heritage and our name as Loitans’.
Impacts of demarcation
Arguments for demarcation and the allocation of private properties emphasise its aim to bring the community economic, environmental and gender empowerment – as women receive equal parcels to men. Sarah notes that this rule is transformational, because ‘women feel more important in the community’. She explains: ‘Before, we haven’t really been recognised. Women appreciate the decision to be included and promise to look after the land, as this will help them care for their children’.
Amos however notes that, ‘the decision to demarcate was a shock to everyone. People believe their normal lives are the way to go’. Now, the local Land Committee is discussing how to mitigate the risks of culture and land loss as the community faces transition into a more ‘modern’ lifestyle.
Women appreciate the decision to be included and promise to look after the land, as this will help them care for their children
The dramatic change in lifestyles, coupled with economic hardship, however means that people are being tempted to sell land below market value, without anywhere else to go. The area’s rich biodiversity is attracting investors in logging and mining while environmentalists are calling for the creation of conservation areas. SAFE Maa has witnessed investors offering deposits to individuals before they even receive the official paperwork.
Amos explains the varied interests at play: ‘These are driving forces trying to alienate land from individual members. We have conservation agencies advocating for the creation of conservancies and individuals trying to enrich themselves by acquiring masses of land, but we are putting up modalities to ensure land is kept within the community.’
In these cases, the Land Committee has refused to issue individual title deeds – causing conflict between community members and the brokers and straining people’s mental health. Sarah highlights that, because ‘there is little understanding on how to use the land without selling and still get an income’ amongst community members with newly demarcated land, ‘they need a lot of sensitisation and knowledge.’
Battles for gender justice
Within the community, men are also seeking to buy up women’s land. As a patriarchal and polygamous society, conservative community members are rejecting women’s inclusion in demarcation – arguing that their role is within the family, rather than pursuing education and employability. Fear of loss of culture, as perceived by educating and empowering women, is also claimed as the primary reason not to abandon FGM/C (female genital mutilation/ cutting) – an issue that Sarah has campaigned creatively against.
Gender inequality is endemic nationwide. The Kenya Land Alliance estimates that only one per cent of women have title deeds, despite constituting 50.3 per cent of the population. Women are also often disproportionately impacted by environmental challenges as they are the principal carers for homesteads, travelling long distances in search of basic necessities. For those in school or employment, this leaves less time for studying and work, thereby curtailing literacy rates, inclusion in decision making, employability and independence.
Sarah explains how the Land Committee has created ways to mitigate risks posed by sales in this context: ‘Allocated plots will be individually managed, but decisions on selling must be passed by the family and clan leaders, of which there are two in every area’. Their best efforts will not resolve wider issues, however.
The government remains entitled to seize communal land, such as Loita, for ‘government projects’ – as seen in Loliondo and Ngorongoro, Tanzania. There, in 2022, the United Arab Emirates made a $17.5 billion deal with the Tanzanian government to create a large trophy hunting reserve on Maasai land. Communities fled, many settling in southern Kenya – once again increasing conflict over resources, space and with wildlife.
Now, additional taxes, offers from foreigners eager to buy up land, and the new experience of profiting from individual properties threaten the future of Loitans on their ancestral land. For Sarah and Amos, a longstanding, complex struggle continues.
