**4. Human-wildlife conflicts**

#### **4.1 Human-wildlife conflicts on the eastern side of the Serengeti Ecosystem**

*Ololosokwan: The Case of a Border Community Abutting Serengeti National Park and Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya.*

Ololosokwan is selected as a case example that demonstrates locational effects; residents being largely from the Maasai tribe that is at the center of the conflict on the eastern side of Serengeti, plus belonging to both Tanzania and Kenya; the community being in an area affected by HWC; the community having been involved in some community natural resources management scheme that has been analyzed and documented; the document upon which much of the information has been drawn having used false statements that may have inadvertently fueled the conflict that is still raging on (August 2023) in the area.

Ololosokwan is located in northern Tanzania along the Tanzania/Kenya adjacent to the Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya and the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania. Its inhabitants are largely Maasai, and it is one of the most wildlife-rich areas in the world [12]. Hundreds of thousands of wildebeests, zebra, and other ungulates pass through the community's land during their annual migration between the Maasai Mara and Serengeti plains.

The authors observed that Ololosokwan's wildlife resources made it one of Tanzania's leading example of community-based ecotourism. They described two ventures that the village had developed since the late 1990s with private tourist companies that earned the village upwards of US\$55,000/− annually, and which they cited as the most substantial revenues earned by any village in Tanzania from wildlife-based enterprises, and have been used for communal investments in any array of social services and infrastructure projects. They observed that the realization of these benefits from wildlife had led to increased interest in development of community land and other resource management institutions and practices. And that wildlife is seen as an important economic asset by the community, and consequently, various efforts are being made to capitalize on this natural endowment. They further observed that with this realization, however, there had been growing conflicts over use, control, and management of land and related resources.

The most outstanding of these conflicts has been one between the villagers and a hunting company that has held a hunting concession in the area since 1992. Whereas *Towards Overcoming the Challenges to Adopting Ecosystem-Based Management Approach… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.113998*

government authorities maintain that the hunting company complies with legal requirements a hunting outfit, the communities view the presence of the hunting company as an infringement on their rights to benefits, access, and control of their natural resources.

Another bone of contention over what the villagers consider to be their rights to access and use of natural resources in the area is the concept of community-based conservation (CBC) as provided by law and as practiced by the government, relative to the understanding and interests of the villagers. The government players' perspective, interests, and actions are based on the principles and procedures of managing a wildlife management area (WMA), which the villagers consider to sideline them in planning and decision-making, and as a consequence short-change them in terms of benefits. Thus, the communities are skeptical and resistant to government guidance and directives.

The conflict that has ensued following dissent, illegal activities, and complaints over what is perceived as Maasai being denied of ancestral and human rights, has attracted sympathizers and human rights activists that have for many years created an impasse due to levelling false accusations against the Government. This situation has, in the process, attracted more NGOs and researchers in the area, as the government was being seen not to pay heed to calls and advices.

Sidney Trompell's research in the area, as published in his article of 2019 titled "The Conservation Bias in Tanzania's Wildlife Management Areas," [13] is one piece of work that demonstrates some of the false accusations and notions that helped to fuel controversy and accusations over what was seen as the government denying the Maasai their rightful access to then Loliondo Controlled Area.

One of the damaging statements in Trompell's work was that, "Ololosokwan lands also fall within the boundaries of Loliondo Game Controlled Area, a purely nominal protected area category that only restricts wildlife utilization and not settlement, livestock grazing, cultivation, or any other human activity." Legally, this is a false statement. He quoted the Wildlife Conservation Act of 1974 that had long been replaced by one enacted in 2009.

According to the Wildlife Conservation Act of 2009 [14] and subsequent amendments, human settlement and livestock grazing are prohibited in Game Protected Areas (GCAs). These prohibitions are spelt out in the provisions of two sections as follows. Concerning establishing Game Protected Areas, Section 16 (5), provides that, "…The Minister shall ensure that no land falling under the village land is included in the Game Controlled Areas." Section 21 (1), on the other hand, prohibits grazing in GCAs by stating that, "Any person shall not, save with the written permission of the Director [of Wildlife] previously sought and obtained, graze any livestock in any game controlled areas."

Another damaging notion is that of referring Maasai as indigenous tribe/people when accusing the government of evacuating the Maasai from what is referred to as ancestral home. Legally, there are no indigenous tribes in Tanzania, and chronologically, the Maasai are more recent comers to Tanzania than most tribes. In fact even in Ngorongoro Conservation Area where the Maasai from Serengeti were transferred to as a compromise agreement in 1959, the Maasai were not the first to settle there. They found some Mbulu tribes, Sonjo, Barabaig, and Tatoga (Datooga) and chased them from the area [15].

The various stakeholders and actors that have ostensibly come to the aid of the villagers of Ololosokwan and other parts of Ngorongoro District have for a long time failed to move the government, as much of their premises for advocacy were based on falsehood, misinformation, lies, and what appeared to be wrong ulterior motives. Occasionally, the conflicts between the villagers and government officials that arose from false information degenerated into violent clashes, as it happened in June 2022, which resulted in a group of villagers killing a policeman.

Meanwhile, the situation in Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA) was becoming intolerable. With the support of sympathizers, the Maasai in the NCA organized to confront the government to demand what they considered to be their rights to resources, social services, and livelihood, at the time when the government had plans to resettle some of them to relieve the pressure on the natural resources of the area and the environment. The people refused to be moved before they could talk to the Minister of Natural Resources and Tourism. The government realized the situation was tense and volatile. The President sent the Prime Minister to speak to the people instead of the Minister of Natural Resources and Tourism that the Maasai of NCA had asked to see.

When the Prime Minister (PM) arrived at Ngorongoro, the situation had degenerated into violent clashes. The PM managed to calm down the villagers, educate them on legal issues, and inform them about the government plan to relocate them to Msomela (Otherwise spelt as Msomera), Handeni District in Tanga Region those who were willing to. The package for moving to Msomela included free transportation of households and their properties, including livestock, a three-bedroom modern house, 3 acres of farmland per family unit, plus 5 acres grazing land; plus a common village land for grazing livestock. Moreover, the community was provided with all the basic social services. This was more than the Maasai could have legally bargained for, and it was more than what the government had ever done for any community of people in compensation for vacating conservation land.

Yet there were detractors, people who ostensibly presented themselves as Maasai human rights advocates and who cried foul and incited the Maasai to refuse to vacate NCA and Loliondo. Other Maasai were persuaded to refuse to go to Msomela where the government had already prepared the area to accommodate them, and instead asked to be relocated to other places that were not in the plan. What is really challenging is that up until August 2023, there were still foreigners persuading Maasai to refuse to relocate to the extent that some Maasai youth were being paid to engage in violent activities to make the exercise difficult, such as beating up journalists so as to hide the truth about who was resisting and why.

Unfortunately, much of the time the stories being told by the Maasai are in stark contrast to statements issued by the government. Some Maasai petitions and complaints do not even mention having been given relocation package! The government on its part has generally been tardy in responding to claims and demands, hence protracted conflicts. Thus, in some instances, it may be difficult to know the truth of the matter, and often, the public is fed with false information. In any case, it is important that the public and all concerned know the following basics about the Maasai and other community vs. government land conflicts, which are in accordance with the Village Land Law No. 5 of 1999 [16].

One, legally, all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the President as trustee on behalf of all citizens.

Two, "Where the President is minded to transfer any area of village land or reserved land *for public interest*, he may direct the Minister (responsible for lands) to proceed in accordance with the provisions of the section."

Three, for the purpose of the above provision, *public interest includes* investments of national interest.

Four, the law provides for procedures for effecting transfers and respective compensation, which if followed would prevent unnecessary conflicts.

#### *Towards Overcoming the Challenges to Adopting Ecosystem-Based Management Approach… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.113998*

Five, it is important to note that Maasai are semi-nomadic, practicing transhumance mode of animal husbandry such that the Maasai identifying themselves as residents of a particular area in Ngorongoro District can be found grazing their livestock in any other area within the district or even outside it during a dry season and going back to home area during the rainy season. This applies also to the Maasai from across the border in Kenya, some of whom cross into Ngorongoro District in search of better pasture. In the same vein, the Maasai from Northern Tanzania can be found as far south as Mbeya grazing their livestock anywhere they can find grass. Some may even decide to settle in new areas, outside what is generally regarded to be Maasai land. A good example is that of Maasai that have even settled in communities in the south around Ruaha National Park in Iringa Region. Thus, putting up ancestral land as the reason for refusing to move from NCA or Loliondo, or any part of Ngorongoro, for that matter is just scapegoating to justify some unreasonable motives.

#### **4.2 Conflicts on the western side of the Serengeti Ecosystem**

Human-wildlife conflicts in the Serengeti, as pointed out earlier, are a historical phenomenon. According to Kideghesho [3], there is common agreement that most of these conflicts emerge as a result of wild animals being accorded a higher priority than human beings. For example, one of the former Serengeti park managers was once quoted as saying openly: "The interests of fauna and flora must come first, those of man and belongings being of secondary importance."

The current government narrative is more positive than it was years ago, but the understanding of the communities and attitudes remain pretty much the same. This is because, though the express goal of the government is to make wildlife conservation beneficial to neighboring communities by making wildlife contribute to improved livelihoods through community-based natural resources conservation initiatives, such as WMAs, and supporting income generating activities, the results on the ground have not matched what is spoken and written by authorities.

First of all, community-based conservation initiatives are usually implemented as a way to deter communities from engaging in illegal natural resources harvesting, which is well and good for the communities if they do indeed realize the promised benefits. Unfortunately, the results have been more to the contrary. Most researchers and writers point to what has variously been seen as communities being cheated.

Bluwstein et al. [17], having worked extensively on WMAs and other communitybased conservation issues in Tanzania, made an observation that encapsulate most of the researchers' observations, remarks, and conclusions about WMAs in Tanzania. He said, "Our findings suggest that WMAs foster limited ownership, participation, and collective action at community level, because WMA governance follows an austere logic of centralized control over key resources. Thus we suggest that it is difficult to argue that WMAs are community-owned conservation initiatives until genuinely devolved and more flexible conservation models are implemented to give space to popular participation rule making."

Such statements are proven correct by facts and figures of western Serengeti situation as presented by Kideghesho [3] on the benefit-based approaches, which were adopted in the Serengeti in 1990s as a strategy of promoting a positive conservation attitude and therefore motivating people to support conservation efforts that have failed to meet expectations. He mainly attributed this to the fact that the benefits granted to local communities have been too minimal to offset the costs caused by prohibitive conservation policies (opportunity costs of conservation) and damage

inflicted by wildlife on property such as crops and livestock. The cost-benefit analyses conducted in the Serengeti have shown that the ratio of wildlife-induced costs to benefits received by local communities was 250:1. Furthermore, these benefits have often been realized indirectly through community development projects, although the costs are localized to individuals.

On the other hand, Kideghesho further observed that the opportunity cost of forgoing the economic activities that are ecologically damaging is often very high, thus making these activities inevitable. For example, illegal hunting in the Serengeti has been flourishing, despite stringent law enforcement, because its returns were 45 times greater compared to those provided legally through the Serengeti Regional Conservation Projects community cropping scheme. Destruction of the breeding and calving grounds for wildebeest in the Maasai Mara (Kenyan part of the Serengeti Ecosystem) between 1977 and 1997 and, consequently, reduction of the wildebeest population by 75%, were mainly caused by the high opportunity cost that landowners would incur by opting for wildlife conservation instead of pursuing mechanized agriculture. The latter was ecologically destructive but economically more attractive to farmers. Its profit was 15 times greater. Furthermore, by virtue of being too minimal, conservation benefits do not contribute adequately to poverty reduction. People's direct dependence on natural resources has therefore remained inevitable.

Currently, the problem of major concern on the western side of Serengeti is the human-elephant conflicts, which have risen to the extent that some communities have to be trained to co-exist with elephants by learning some mitigation measures and being facilitated by conservation authorities and organizations, whenever possible, to have elephant-proof food storage facilities [3, 18, 19]. HECs are said to have risen following elephant population recovery from the period of intense poaching (2009– 2014) and as humans have settled in protected area buffer zone traditionally used as elephant migratory routes.

Writing about the farmers living around Ikona WMA, Lucy King of Save the Elephants, and Head of Human-Elephant Co-existence Program at the Save the Elephants and Elephant Crisis Fund observed that perennial raids on crop fields and grain stores had made the community intolerant of elephants and that they often viewed them as problem animals. She observed further that although there was enough land to grow enough food, one elephant could wipe out food that would have lasted a family several months [19].

The above observation having been made by a pro-elephant person on damage caused by elephants speaks volumes about the losses suffered by communities from elephants, considering elephants do not move about singly, and that they move about in herds, plus they may not raid a farm only once. And, apart from crops in the fields, elephants may also devour the year/season's food storage and leave the farmer without food. The situation in certain parts of western Serengeti communities is dire, and the victims thus feel compelled to turn to protected areas for bush meat for the pot and cash to survive.

### **5. Management and technical issues**

Usually when discussing challenges or problems facing protected areas management, there is a general tendency of writing as if it were from the management view point and thus overlooking issues within the administration or management of the resources that could pose problems in advancing conservation interests. This section demonstrates the importance of having the right leadership, particularly, the chief

#### *Towards Overcoming the Challenges to Adopting Ecosystem-Based Management Approach… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.113998*

executive officer of an institution. For you could have resources and a good board of directors, but if the chief executive officer is inept or incompetent, the institution could collapse or the conservation objectives may not be achieved.

Basically, the understanding and inclination of leadership has a tremendous bearing on what can be and what is done towards managing personnel, resources, and conservation actions, which, in turn, is reflected in the performance in advancing conservation goals. Although boards of directors are the highest leadership positions for organizations, the chief executives are central to the management of the organizations and hence the protected areas under them. Boards of directors are essentially as good as their chief executives. This is largely due to the official tradition of boards of directors meeting quarterly to deliberate on and approve what is presented to them by the CEO in a 1- or 2-day meeting. What I learnt from my experience as a member of the Board Trustees sitting in those meetings is that CEOs determine the agenda, the proceedings, and outcome of Board Meetings and hence the direction and performance of protected area management.

This was amply demonstrated by what happened to TANAPA and NCAA in the early 1980s when the two institutions almost collapsed due to management problems deriving from the personalities of the chief executives, although, on the surface, the problems of the two institutions appeared to be lack of funds. For TANAPA, the problem was that the CEO of that time was more concerned with his personal matters than the needs of the institution, personnel, and conservation activities. In addition, the CEO seemed to be lacking in requisite professional qualifications.

The CEO of NCAA, on the other hand, had the necessary professional conservation expertise and experience, plus experience in administering government entities and high offices, but by reason of attitude, he could not get along with the Maasai in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, in spite of being a Maasai himself.

I found out about the moribund state of the two institutions through a small investigation I conducted in several northern protected areas and subsequently wrote a petition to conservation authorities imploring them to take measures to save the two institutions. The petition ended up in the National Assembly and was discussed by members of Parliament during the budget session of 1984. The National Assembly took the matter seriously and threatened to "withhold a shilling" from the budget (meaning, not to approve the budget) of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism. Hon. Paul Bomani, the then Minister of MNRT, responded by appointing a Commission of members of Parliament including the petitioner to investigate the two institutions and recommend a course of action. The Commission was chaired by one of the Members of Parliament, Hon. Tabitha Siwale, hence the name Siwale Commission, and I was appointed to serve on the Commission as the technical expert member of the otherwise, all Members of Parliament. Two senior officers from the Wildlife Division in the Ministry served as the Secretariat to the Commission.

Following submission of the Siwale Commission recommendations, among other things, the two CEOs were removed from their positions, and with new management and other changes in the administration of the two institutions, the latter were revived in a very short time. Within 3 years, the institutions were back to normal level of operations and financially liquid.

The lesson I have learned from the above story and elsewhere is that, for any initiative, strategy, and management approach to succeed, it has to be led by a chief executive who is appropriately and adequately qualified for the mission, and, above all, s/he must have the passion necessary to work beyond duty.
