UTAFITI(New Series) Vol. 3 No. 1, 1996:47-65 State, pastoralists and Education in Tanzania: How Can Conflicts and Tensions be Resolved? Victor M. Mkkwa* Abstract Tanzania is one of the lOp ten countries in the world which ICCOmmocIate the largest concentration of the traditional livestock producers. Sinceindependencc ill 1961, the Tanzanian state bas bee~ making various attempts to provide basic social services to the pastorsIists and other mobile communities. In so doing, however, the state bas been evolving Policies and practices many of which are in conflict widI the needs and interests of these communities because they are not based on dIeir socio-ecooomic realities: a long established and cherished cultural lieritage, livestock production as a principal means of livelihood., high mobility through constant migration, and the harsh enviromnent characteriZed by drought, animal rustling, disease, and poor means of communication. The pastoralists themselves have accumulated a reservoir of koowledge and experience in managing their own lives in their oWn way, and ill their own environment. It is encouraging to note from various studies that there is an ever increasing demand for education and other dimensions of development in the hitherto uncaptured, communities. This article, banking on what other people interested in the welfare of these commumties have found out, suggests some alternative educationai strategies to assist the pastoral and mobile communities to promote their own development without losing their freedom, autonomy, ecooomy, social controls and-self- reliance. The article advocates a more comprehensive study whereby the communities will be fully involved in determining what, how, where, and when to learn. Introduction Although one of the ,key elements of Tanzania's education policy has been the promotion of equitable access to education for all segments of the population; great inequalities still exist and persist between children from urban and rural • Faculty of Education, University ofDar es Salaam 48 V. M. Mlekwa areas, children of the poor and the rich; males and females, children from different geographical locations, and those from different cultural groups (United Republic of Tanzania (URT), 1992). In this regard, the pastoral and mobile communities are the most disadvantaged of all. With increasing deterioration of the economy, leading to a sharp decline in the domestic resource base needed to sustain the provision of social services, Tanzanians are now being called upon to supplement government efforts by meeting some of the costs involved. As richer communities take on greater responsibility for education, more inequalities are likely to surface unless the government works out sQme mechanisms to support educational activities in the poor parts of the country. In this context, it is encouraging to note increased government commitment to delegate decisions on the management and fmancing of education to the local level (DRT, 1990). Until recently, a centralized structure for management of education has been in place and has led to the development of a rigid, crowded and often irrelevant curriculum. Consequently, the educational scene in Tanzania has been characterized by deterioration in physical facilities: shortages in textbooks, instructional materials and equipment; as well as declining quality and motivation of teachers (URT, 1990). All these factors and others, have contributed much to the declining quality of education. This article makes a modest attempt to show that the pastoral and mobile communities in Tanzania have not only remained in the periphery of educational policy making but they have also been greatly marginalized by the policies formulated by the state. It is argued that there is an urgent need to implement the World Declaration on EdUcation for All and Framework for Action to Meet Basic Learning Needs launched in Thailand in 1990. The article is divided into six sections. The fIrst one briefly points out some problems in defIning these social groups, while the second examines their production systems and social organization. The third section addresses the issue of marginalisation of these pastoral and mobile communities, and the fourth one maps out educational provisions, highlighting some of the main problems and constraints. While the fIfth section discusses ~ity issues and provides some suggestions on what should be done to create learning opportunities to the hitherto uncaptured population, the sixth makes some concluding remarks pointing out key issues which need serious investigation and action. State, Pastoralistsand EducationIn Tanzania 49 Towards an Understanding of Pastoral and Mobile Communities For descriptive purposes, pastoral and mobile communities in Tanzania, and elsewhere, can be located at three points on the continuum. First, there are pure pastoralists whose most of their gross revenue emanates from livestock or livestock related activities (Mtengeti, 1994), second, there are agro- pastoralists whose livelihood is sustained both by agricultural production and livestock production. Kjaerby (1979:2), thus defmed agro-pastoralism as "a combination of crop and livestock production which is distinguished not only from pure agriculture, on one side, and pure pastoralism on the other, but also from mixed farming, with which it is often confused." It should be borne in mind, however, that the so-called pure pastoralists, hunter-gatherers and agro-pastoralists themselves are not homogeneous groups. Over time, and due to a number of factors that will be dealt with later, some of those who used to be pure pastoralists have been steadily drifting into agriculture to become agro-pastoralists, while others have abandoned pastoralism to become agriculturalists. Compilation of demographic data about the pastoralists and other mobile communities is difficult for .two main reasons. First, census data have been silent, on ethnic or tribal differences since the Tanzanian state resolved to discourage tribalism and ethnic sentiments. Second, these groups are so mobile that it is not easy to access all of them for reliable enumeration. Nevertheless, it is a well-known fact that East Africa accommodates the largest concentration of the traditional livestock producers in the world (Doornboss and Markakis, 1991). Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, rank among the top ten countries in the world in.terms of pastoral population size. In all these countries, the Maasai constitute one of the largest pastoral groups in East Africa numbering as many as 250,000 people, while Simanjiro District is the largest of the four Maasai districts in Tanzania with a population of 71,531 practising pastoralism as a way of life (Ole-Lengisugi, 1994: 1). The pastoral and mobile communities have distinct characteristics shaped by different economic, political, social and geographical circumstances. And yet they share a common denominator: the fact that they are the most disadvantaged groups as far as access to, and acquisition of, educational and other social facilities are concerned largely due to their constant migration and dispersion (Chimah, 1990). They live under very difficult conditions, in harsh environments, and yet they use various strategies to survive in those risky environments such as resource exploitation, mobility (in response to 50 V. M. Mlekwa unpredictable forage and water availability), escape mobility (long distanee migration to escape drought conditions), livestock accumulation and diversification of livestock species, income and subsistence sources such as migrant wage income (Mtengeti, 1994). The next section focuses on production systems and social organization of the typical pastoralists, namely the Maasai. Production Systems and Social Organization Production Systems The traditional economy of pastoral societies is based on raising animals which include cattle, came1s, buffalo, reindeer, goats, and sheep. For most pastoralists, their animals-particularly the large stock like cattle and camels-are a status symbol, and the most significant part of their self-identity and self-respect (Chimah, 1990). For the pastoral Maasai, for example, cattle of the shorthorned Zebu type is the most valuable property in society. In addition to being a source of milk, meat and blood, it provides the Maasai with their basis for subsistence and, coupled with grazing land, water and family labour, it constitutes the principal means of pastoral production. It provides food, utensils, clothing and adornment. It signifies wealth, conveys status, serves as a medium of exchange, and legitimizes marriage. It symbolizes social relationships, is an object of affection and ritual, and signifies life itself (Arheim, 1985:8). Clansmen have some rights in each other's herds, but ownership of livestock is primarily individual. Water rights on the other hand are controlled by the clan, while specific wells, springs and water holes are. usually controlled by local clan groups or certain families. In areas where water is abundant, such as in permanent rivers, possession is communal. Pastoral societies as a whole subsist mainly off the produce of their animals, even though there is currently an increasing exchange of livestock for agricultural products between pastoralists and agriculturalists. For centuries, the pastoral Maasai have resisted the adoption of alternative modes of subsistence like agriculture, fishing and hunting. What should not be overlooked here is the fact that pure pastoral diet is endowed with a high cultural value: in addition to being a dietary ideal, it is also a marker of ethnic identity. State, Pastoralists and Education In Tanzania 51 Social Organization Contrally to the views of some people, the socio-economic organization of pastoralists is quite rational. Social organization is flexible so as to allow for periodic contraction, expansion and organization of herding units and social groups following changes in environmental conditions (Arhem, 1981). The organization of family labour and the management of herds are geared at striking a balance between the needs of the family (milk, blood, and meat) and the needs of the livestock (grass and water), as well as a balance between- man, domestic livestock and the natural environment. As Arheim (1981:10) puts it: Social groups are recruited on the basis of practical considerations of resource utilization and congeniality in co-operation rather than static .kinship ties or rules of residence. Unfortunately, many development agents working in these pastoral communities do not seem to appreciate the uniqueness of their cultures and the sophistication of their socio-economic organizations. One of the organisationaI dimensions of the Maasai society, for example, is the age-set system which forms the basis for the Maasai political organization, and provides a model for the oganization of society and the social division of labour (Arheim, 1985). For the Maasai, there are three distinctive phases in human growth and maturation. Uncircumcised boys, below the age of 14 years, provide the labour for the routine herding activities in the pastoral community. On reachjng the age of 1-4-17 years, the boys are circumcised and iDitiated into warriorhood: they become junior warriors and .enter an age-set. Seven or eight years later a ceremony known as 'eunoto' is held at which the junior warriors are promoted into senior warriors, and at which the local leaders of the age-set are chosen. Thereafter,. the warriors are permited to marry. A final ceremony is held, about seven years after 'eunoto', to mark the end of . warriorbood and give a name to the age-set. After this ceremony, known as , 'Olgensher' the warriors become junior elders or 'bayan', who are now supposed to settle down and assume full family responsibilities. Elders wield both political and spiritual power in the community: they exert control over the warriors, they maintain and restore social order in the community, they ttansniit their accumulated experience related to herding and resource nianagemeIit to the younger generation, and they serve as spiritual guardians and sponsors of religious ceremonies, passing on the cherished 52 V. M. Mlekwa traditions and customs of the people to -the youths and children (Arheim, 1985). As early as thirteen years, a girl is eligible for marriage. Her husband gives her a small herd which she is expected to look after and keep in trust for her future sons. As a housewife and mother, she constructs her own hut in the 'boma' of her husband, ana performs many domestic chores including fetching firewood and water, milking cows, loading and unloading donkeys as family moves from one camp to another, and looking after her children. Other tasks include cleaning and preparation of hides and skins for making skin clothing and bed coverings, making bead ornaments and necklaces, designing and keeping the milking gourds clean, and distribution of milk supplies among family members (Arheim, 1981). Decision-making machinery in the Maasai society comprises the age-set leaders of the locality plus the Council of Elders. Religious powers are vested with the 'laibon', a ritual expert who is supposed to protect people from illness and misfortune, to cure diseases and perform rainmaking rituals. He is quite a powerful and respected person in the Maasai society: no age-set ceremony, for example, can take place without his blessing (Arheim, 1981). Marginalisation of Pastoral Communities Following their parochial perceptions of pastoralists, governments in Africa and elsewhere in the world where these people are found, have introduced policies and practices which have resulted in marginalisation of the people, environmental degradation, and disintegration of the pastoral economy. McCabe, Perkins and Schoefield (1992), for example, have shown that the dual policy of linking conservation of natural resources with human development has brought about adverse effects on the subsistence economy and nutrition of the Maasai living in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. What emerges quite clearly is that while the environment has been protected, the economy of the Ngorongoro Maasai is seriously declining. As a whole, the people are increasingly being unable to support themselves by pastoralism, and there is clear evidence of malnutrition in the human population. The authors further argue that the situation of the Ngorongoro Maasai is very much similar to what is happening in the pastoral regions of East Africa. State intervention in the development of pastoral societies in Tanzania has been further studied by Mustafa (1989), who has shown the extent to which the livestock-producing peasants (pastoralists) of Tanzania have been State, Pastoralistsand EducationIn Tanzania 53 adversely affected by state policies which give more priority to the state capitalist sector. Tracing the process of capitalist accumulation from the colonial era to the present times-with reference to the Parakuyo Maasai pastoralists of Western Bagamoyo District-Mustafa has demonstrated that the latter are increasingly being transformed into agro-pastoralists, proletarianized, and dispossessed of their major forms of production, namely land and livestock. Likewise, agro-pastoralists have also been adversely affected by state policies on social and economic development. Lawi (1992) for example, studied what he called 'the process of modernization' (sic) of the Iraqw peasantry of Babati, Hanang and Mbulu districts during 1960-90, and found out that the expansion of commercial cropping of wheat, maize and beans since the 1970s had resulted in social and environmental degradation, as well as other man-made ecological problems, all being attributed largely to the propensity for profit maximization. Doornboss and Markakis (1991), examining the crisis of pastoralism and the role of the state, have shown that the traditional livestock sector started to decline during colonial ruJ~ whereby pastoralists were incorporated into the modem states without pastoralism itself being incorporated into the colonial economy. They have continued to show the marginalisation of pastoralism accelerated in the post-colonial era through encroachment into the pastoralist terrain by commercial agriculture, measures taken by the independent states to limit pastoralist movement, and degradation of the pastoralist habitat by recurrent drought which raises the spectre of desertification in many areas. A central problem discussed in the literature on how best to facilitate the social and economic development of pastoral and mobile communities is whether or not these people should be sedentary or remain mobile. Official policy in the East African region seems to regard settlement as the only solution to the numerous problems posed by the wandering herders, while hardly any effort is made to improve production in the traditional livestock sector (Doornboss and Markakis, 1991). Expectations of most African governments, Tanzania .included, are twofold. First, that the pastoraIists must settle down as quickly as possible if they are to receive services such as water, health and education; and, second, that the primitive (sic) system of livestock management will in the fmal analysis break down completely (Mtengeti, 1994). These expectations, and others of the like, are made regardless of the fact that settling pastoralists requires either an improvement of the carrying capacity around the village or 54 V.M. Mlekwa destocking-measures which are hardly taken, while the latter is unacceptable to pastoralists (Mtengeti, 1994). As has already been shown, attempts to settle pastoralists, through coercion or persuasion, have resulted in land degradation around the villages due to overgrazing . .In their own traditional wisdom, the pastoralists and mobile communities have generally been resisting the whole notion of sedentarization. Mustafa (1990), for examples, has doc~ented the Tanzanian Government's attempt to villagise the llparakuyo Maasai in Bagamoyo District, showing that after the Arusha Declaration in 1967, the settlement scheme was changed into one of developing ujamaa villages for the pastoralists. However, what comes out very clearly" from Mustafa's descriptive analysis of the llparakuyo Maasai experience is that the latter resisted the government move as "the idea of permanent settlement without the necessarY infrastructural development of water and grazing to support their cattle was too suicidal to contemplate;" and consequently "the idea of the ujamaa villages was abandoned as a failure" (Mustafa, 1990:108). Writing on the same people, Ndagala (1991) has demonstrated that, notwithstanding the various pressures to abandon their production system, the llparakuyo pastoralists have managed to hold on to their herds by persistently fighting against settlement, even though by so doing they continue to lose their grazing land to cultivators and various state institutions. Ndagala then laments that uncontrolled loss of land is likely to lead to the pastoralists' ultimate loss of their herds, which in turn may lead to loss of their self-reliance. The next sectioll examines state-sponsored education in pastoral areas, with" a focus on problems and constraints which need to be resolved to hasten the development process among the pastoraliSts. Educational Provisions: Problems and Constraints Traditionally the pastoralists, notably the Maasai, were unwilling to send their children to school. Currently, however, there is an increasing demand for education. Muir (1994), for example, has found out that nearly 67.8% and 60% of sampled households in Simanjiro and Monduli districts had at least one child in school. Contributing factors to this change in attitude towards education include "a need for chanS~ given the decline in herds and the pastoral economy; a need to be litel'* in Swahili, and to be able to demand better treatment at markets, hospitals, etc." (p. 20). One should also not State, Pastoralistsand Education In Tanzania 55 forget that as more educated people are returning to their home areas to work, they are setting an example of a salary and a higher standard of living. Consequently, education "is equated with getting more power, with leadership and influence outside the traditional institution" (Muir, 1994: 20-21). Unfortunately, notwithstanding this increasing demand for education and the government's stated policy of promoting equitable access to education without any discrimination, most children of pastoralists and other mobile communities have no easy access to