Posted on 17-2-2004

New wealth brings mixed fortunes for Masai

Jeremiah Saikong became the most popular man in any bar he walked into. Samuel Kariangei hanged himself. Kadurie Eletiko set up a taxi business and paid her father a dowry of 40,000 Kenyan shillings so she could marry the man of her choice.
Dol Dol in northern Kenya is a rugged, arid place where money was once as scarce as the water that seeps up from the boreholes in the dry season.

The area, however, has been transformed: first by the allegations over the conduct of British soldiers who trained here, and then by the huge sums of cash that have been paid out to communities which sought compensation.

Some have profited from the pace of change, others have been destroyed.

In September 2002, a group of Masai and Samburu tribesmen received a £4.5m settlement from the Ministry of Defence for injuries and deaths blamed on munitions left by the British army.

Thousands more bomb injury claimants came forward, and local women alleged rape by British soldiers. Doubt has been cast on many of the fresh claims, and last week a second group of more than 1,000 bomb injury claimants who had sought up to £40m settled for £500,000.

Aside from the controversy stirred up by the claims, the money that has already been paid out has caused a startling transformation in a traditional society.

In fact, it had begun to change before the compensation money arrived. Most of the population live in scattered homesteads on the hillsides, close to where their herds graze, and sleep in a manyatta, a one-roomed hut. But some of the Masai men and youths had already abandoned their herds of goats and cattle to set up businesses in Dol Dol "centre", where a few dozen tin-roofed shops and bars flank the dusty high street.

But the compensation paid to 233 men and women accelerated the pace of change.

Kadurie Eletiko is one of the success stories. The Eletiko family refused to speak to the Guardian - like many of the locals, they are suspicious of foreigners and fear that the British government plans to take the money back. But for any visitor to the Eletikos' homestead, the change in their circumstances is obvious.

The family's manyatta, built of saplings and dried cow dung topped with a flat tin roof, still stands on the slope where their goats graze, but it is abandoned now. On the crest of the hill, dwarfing their old home, is a new, gabled, timber house.

Mrs Eletiko, who received the equivalent of £4,300 for a burn to her left arm, bought a four wheel drive vehicle with the money and set up a taxi service taking locals to the nearest large town, Nanyuki.

She built a new house, and exchanged her traditional bed of sticks and animal skins for a modern bed.

"She has a television, and sofa sets," a neighbour said. "She also paid her own dowry for her husband. She gave her father 40,000 [Kenyan] shillings [£280] to buy cattle."

Sempeyo Boboke is another of the success stories. Mrs Boboke, whose son died, received more than £20,000. She too bought a four wheel drive and set up a taxi business. She built her family a new house, and bought a plot of farmland in Nanyuki.

The family were away when the Guardian called at their home but, again, the transformation was obvious.

The Bobokes have demolished their manyatta, and built a timber house next to it. In the living room, decorated with a kitsch poster of kittens and a ram's skull hanging from a nail, the family's maid sat dandling their youngest child.

The maid, Elizabeth Nosip, said: "They have employed me to clean the house, fetch firewood and water, and to take their little girl to school. They are rich now. The money has been good for them."

It may not be a coincidence that in two cases where the money was well spent, it was given to women. James Legei, manager of a community group, Osiligi, said: "The women here are more considerate. They are the ones who have to care for the children."

When Jeremiah Saikong received his share of the compensation, just over £10,000, he lost all self-control. Nuru Abdi, a local man, said: "He was drinking a lot of alcohol. When he met people, he didn't want to talk, he just gave them money. When he was out he would buy drinks for the whole bar."

The money had all but disappeared when his wife intervened. Aided by Osiligi, she took her husband to court and had the equivalent of £1,600 set aside to educate their children.

For Samuel Kariangei, the money appears to have been fatal. Like Mr Saikong, the opportunity to buy alcohol in seemingly unlimited quantities was too much of a temptation. Mr Kariangei hanged himself recently, after drinking his way through more than £5,000.

A police spokesman in Nanyuki confirmed reports that the man had hanged himself after finding his bank account empty. "Police in Dol Dol say they have never seen this man sober," he added. As well as being blamed for an outbreak of alcoholism among the Masai, the "bomb money" has also been said to bring bad luck. Locals spoke of one man who received his compensation, then died soon after in a bus crash - in which every other passenger was unhurt.

"Maybe the mzungu [white man] has cursed the money," Mr Abdi said.

Conmen have been attracted to Dol Dol too; in one case, a man was sold a Land Rover for more than twice its value, while another tribesman was cheated into paying for a car he never received.

It was expected that a cattle-herding society would have difficulty with the influx of such vast sums. "We tried to prepare them to receive this amount of money," said Mr Legei, of Osiligi. "We also tried to warn them of the dangers.

"Many of them did not know how much 1m Kenyan shillings is. They had never handled large sums of money before."

The Masai were given advice on how to open bank accounts, and investment experts from a US bank gave seminars on how to deal with the windfalls.

"The thing that people knew was buying cattle," Mr Legei said. "Also, some of them were thinking of buying land. We gave them some alternatives. We ex plained what shares were. They said they might try that - but of course people fear to go into what they are not sure of."

Since the Europeans first came to east Africa, the Masai have been romanticised for their warrior traditions, striking looks, and simple lifestyle. Among the Masai themselves, however, there are many who want to adapt to the modern world, and have now been helped by British taxpayers' money to transform their lives.

But there are also many sad victims of a collision between the western way of rendering justice through money, and a delicately balanced, traditional society.