Across East Africa, the Maasai market in Kenya’s capital Nairobi (Maasai for the stream of cold waters) is a household name. The market is made up of an array of African artifacts and it forms a regional convergence zone for different peoples and tourists. Every Tuesday, the market is buzzing with activity; the milling crowd growing bigger with each passing minute. Taxi drivers cash in on the many tourists who throng the market in search of “authentic” African souvenirs to take back home.
People from various African cultural backgrounds in the region, joined by those who have already lost their cultural identity, referred to in Maasai as Ilashumpa Orook (black Europeans), frequent the market, making it a boiling point of business activity revolving around cultural artifacts.
It is curious that the market is commonly called “Maasai market,” because Kenya is a conglomeration of more than 45 distinct communities. Many lines of argument abound as to the reason the market was named after the Maasai, one of the most well known and culturally resilient communities in the East Africa region.
Since the colonialists set foot in this region, Maasai pastoralists have resisted the temptations offered by the west and have retained most, if not all, of the customs of their tribal mores. This has often been used not only to give East African states a much needed cultural identity, but also to market the region as a tourist destination due to the conservation efforts of these pastoralists, which have kept their lands teeming with huge herds of game and various plant species.
As such, according to one school of thought, the Maasai name has become a by word for culture and tourism, and now members of the community feel they have been used as a familiar background.
“When tourists come to Kenya and happen not to see a Maasai, it is said that they feel they haven’t quite experienced the Kenyan wild,” says 70-year-old Kiminta Ole Seki. Ole Seki is a resident of Kitengela, which was in the news last year when the Maasai residents there killed marauding lions (from the Nairobi National Park) preying on their livestock.
Stan Sullivan, a tourist from Canada, echoes the Maasai elder’s perception. “Back home, virtually every travel agency targeting Eastern Africa has to have a photograph of a Maasai looking at nature or doing one thing or the other, and the thought of meeting these people face to face is in itself quite a marketing strategy,” he says.
The Maasai market, which today has almost nothing to do with the Maasai, has a trader population of more than 400 on any given Tuesday, but there are usually only 10 Maasai traders. Beadworks resembling theirs, though not quite genuine, overwhelm the market. Undeniably, invoking these pastoral people’s name has paid off, earning a bounty to some individuals, companies, and the tourism industry while exposing the Maasai and their close cousins the Samburu (Isampurr) to commercial exploitation.
This has often earned a ricochet from the Maasai women at the market. “We are a proud and unique people. We do not prey on other peoples things as we hate being parasitic; but unfortunately we have become a perennial target right from the colonial days and today [other communities] use our name to promote business,” laments 38-year-old Mashipei Sakau, a beadwork trader at the market.
She adds in the characteristic worked up Maasai style, “Look around you, all these masqueraders purporting to sell our beadworks cannot utter three words in Maasai, know nothing about the cultural significance of the various colors and patterns, and yet we claim to have a system in place to check some of these inequalities and parasitic robbery!”
Musau Makau, a wood carver from the Kamba community neighboring the Maasai to the east, admits that there exists a glaring injustice in exploitation of certain Kenyan communities to market the country. “To be honest,” he says, “if fame and riches were compatible in Africa, then the Maasai would be extremely rich. They would be the Hollywood class of the region because they have been used in every commercial manner right from the day the white man first stepped here. Therefore, they need government protection form further exploitation and erosion of their cultures and property.”
Makau thinks the name of the market is the result of an effort in the early 90’s by Minister for local authorities, William Ole Ntimama, to allow his people to gain from their indigenous knowledge and cultural arts and crafts by creating a market principally for their traditional products. The theory is shared across Maasai country that the establishment of this place was an effort by this pro-Maasai rights politician to invite the Maasai to identify with a project that they could take over as a means of creating markets and job opportunities to the women and daughters of this community, as beadwork is culturally a preserve of the womenfolk.
As much as the idea was meant to benefit Maasai women, no sooner had the market started near Nairobi’s central business district than it was “hijacked” by outsiders on the pretext that they as well had cultural artifacts to sell and would complement the Maasai and enhance diversity.
“But all they did was copy our art and craft and embark on a vicious competition with the rightful owners of the products. They have fabricated stories regarding us in order to convince the tourist clientele and it should not be allowed to thrive in a modern state,” says Margaret Saitoti one of the pioneer traders at the Maasai market.
One would be justified to ask why the Maasai did not protest the “invasion,” but Mopel Karatina, a university graduate whose tuition was paid through sales of Maasai jewelry at the market, says that the prevailing politics of numbers in Kenya is to blame.
“The Maasai in Kenya constitute only about 400,000 people, and this is negligible compared to other communities. This could possibly be the reason used to allow outsiders into the market in order for the powers-that-be to please the majority dominant communities,” says Mopel.
Today, with the saddest outlook, the overwhelmed Maasai glance around and witness the savage trend contagiously spreading and entrenching itself to the very core of what was meant to benefit their people. Mopel feels this is unjustifiable in a state that proclaims the principle of equal opportunities.
“It amounts to lack of commitment by the state in its duty to protect all Kenyans against exploitation both locally and internationally,” he says. This well educated pastoralist wonders why the government does not patent these artifacts and cultures. “After all,” he reasons, “one of the core responsibilities of a government is to protect its citizens against any form of exploitation.”
Mopel fears that by not moving fast to apply intellectual property rights, the government is squandering the Maasai people’s apparent riches of artistic talent and culture. He warns that failure to do so may have far reaching social and political ramifications in the future, as it might be detrimental to the whole Kenyan community.
Traditional traders at this market point another accusing finger at the media saying it has failed the Maasai because media houses have been guilty of biases.
Joshua Lemunka, a Maasai from Tanzania, accuses the media of immoral injustice through its failure to highlight this glaring abuse. He argues that, in stark contrast to the role of the media, its silence has instead exposed the Maasai, who should have gained by the sheer use of their name to further marginalization. “The media gives the Maasai very little coverage, if any, or simply coverage that is laden with negative innuendos, thus failing in its cardinal duty of exposing insidious exploitation which is a violation of their rights, while on the other hand, it has been influential in dismantling the former regime and bringing in a new one,” laments Joshua.
This brings into focus the issue of intellectual property rights and the protection of indigenous peoples’ rights as stipulated in the International Labor Organization Convention 169 article 4.1. This convention states in part that special measures shall be adopted as appropriate for safeguarding the institutions, property, labor, cultures, and environments of the peoples concerned.
Unfortunately, Kenya has yet to ratify this convention and there exists glaring inequalities as the existing policies were adopted from those of the colonial era, which were principally lopsided and sought to marginalize certain communities while favoring others. This is a stark contradiction of the Narc government’s commitment in creation of wealth and involvement of local communities in tourism.
Historically, the Maasai are on record as the first Kenyan indigenous people ever to sue the British government in 1913 for abrogation of a treaty they had entered, and the colonial attitude towards them was unfriendly ever since. But it serves as a pointer to the Maasai people’s belief in fair play and justice.
The Maasai market issue serves as an example of the unabashed exploitation of indigenous peoples by the same state that is charged with the mandate to protect them.
