fPcN interCultural:

friends of Peoples close to Nature

WTN Arusha / Tanzania 28. Aug. 2008

Two human rights defenders from the Hadzabe people in Tanzania have been acquitted by the Mbulu District Court from all charges brought against them in an attempt for revenge, because they had successfully defended the tribal homeland of their people against a corrupt deal. A Dubai conglomerate of wealthy sports-hunters from Abu-Dabi had been trying franticly to establish a sports-hunting area in the culturally and ecologically most important part of the Yaida Valley, along Lake Eyasi in Tanzania.

Signs of Hadza extinction now evident
Just a few weeks after the Arabian hunting firm officially pulled out of Yaeda, a new monster is reported to have moved into the vast valley and intends to unleash even worse destruction.
Yaeda valley lying mostly within Mbulu District in Manyara, with part of it extending to Singida region is currently being visited by hordes of people interested in starting mining activities in the area.

Tue, 10/16/2007 - 12:18 — A German narrated film, about the Hadza, from the Rift valley, titled - "No need for development" this documentary from fPcN Germany describes the situation of the last hunter and gatherer in Tanzania, the Hadzabe, back in the late 1990s.

Hadzabe - Kein Bedarf nach Entwicklung ist eine Filmdokumentation von Freunde der Naturvölker e.V. und beschreibt die Situation des letzten Jäger- und Sammlervolkes in Tansania, die Hadzabe.

Mon, 07/23/2007 - 07:28 — An alert reader left a link to this article in the Daily Mail. By turns stereotypical and sensitive, the article reveals a few more details about the UAE trying to by Hadzabe land and the plight they are facing:

To the dismay of anthropologists and champions of the Earth's remaining tribal people, two wealthy Arab princes, who have made billions from oil and gas in the United Arab Emirates, are negotiating with the Tanzanian government to buy the Hadzabe's ancient lands to use as their own private hunting grounds.

Fri, 06/29/2007 - How come then, the living home land area for Innocent Hadzabe people being leased to United Arab Emirates royal family for the sake of establishing “personal safari play ground”! Calling them “backwards” now leasing their land! This is totally unfair and it violates human rights!

Where is democracy? Is it not for real that our Tanzanian Government a democratic government?! If the answer is yes, does it not follow and obey the definition postulated by Sir Abraham Lencollin; government for the people by the people!

Thu, 06/14/2007 - The Hadzabe, a hunter gather tribe in Tanzania, Africa, are believed to be the second-oldest people on Earth - but of course that is not saving them from being threatened with eviction and extinction.

Some greedy members of the United Arab Emirates 'royal' family want to turn the Hadzabe tribal hunting lands into a private 'by helicopter only' safari playground - so the Hadzabe who have been there for over 50,000 years will just have to go.

Wed, 05/23/2007 - The government is investigating alleged violations of human rights against the Hadzabe ethnic group committed by social researchers, tour firms, filmmakers and some non-governmental organizations.

Mbulu District Commissioner Elias Goroi said the activities of tour firms, film makers, social researchers and NGOs operating within Hadzabe territory at Yaeda Chini and Lake Eyasi basin were being probed.

The Hadzabe are an ancient traditional group of hunters and fruit gatherers.

A short, German narrated, film about the life of the Hadzabe bushman, of East Africa.

This film can be bought from us, in DVD or PAL VHS, or high res MPEG. See our Media Order form under the Films section.

Roy Sesana has seen a lot of the world. Last year the seventy-six year old Bushman travelled to the United States, in order to draw attention both to the ” First People of the Kalahari”, an organisation he had founded in 1991, and to his own tribe. On 9th December 2005 he was awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize in Stockholm.

He is sitting beside me in the East Side Hotel in Berlin, and patiently awaiting the questions I am about to ask him. He scrutinizes everything around him. "Here, in the northern hemisphere, the "White” people live at the expense of the people of the South."

1.Do the Bushmen have a representative in the Botswana government?

The bushmen don’t have any representatives in the Botswana government

2.The Botswanas governments says that the relocation of the Gana and Gwi Bushmen to New Xade would be necessary for providing educational development. Would you say that this kind of development is a good alternative for your people to live in dignity and self-determination?

My name is Roy Sesana; I am a Gana Bushman from the Kalahari in what is now called Botswana. In my language, my name is ‘Tobee' and our land is ‘T//amm'. We have been there longer than any people has been anywhere.

When I was young, I went to work in a mine. I put off my skins and wore clothes. But I went home after a while. Does that make me less Bushman? I don't think so.

JOHANNESBURG, Mar. 4, 2005 (IPS/GIN) -- The plight of an indigenous community in South Africa, the San, was placed in the spotlight this week with the launch of a report by the South African Human Rights Commission.

Entitled 'Report on the Inquiry Into Human Rights Violations in the Khomani San Community in South Africa', the 35-page document details what commission chairman Jody Kollapen said was "a sad story of neglect and of indifference".

The latest news out of Botswana is that the government is going to attempt to amend its own constitution to be "tribally neutral". Great idea on the face of it, right? Diffusing tribal and ethnic conflicts, thereby safeguarding Botswana from the dangers of ever descending into tribal war. Or is that why it"s being done?

Today, there are some 2000 Hadzabe (singular : Hadza) living around Lake Eyasi (in Hadza language : Balangida!), which is situated within the great east African rift valley. The Hadzabe speak their own distinct click lout language and are known to be the aborigines on their land. It may well also be assumed that they are the direct descendants of the early humans who lived there some 3 million years ago as bone findings indicate.

For many years our organisation friends of Peoples close to Nature has been concerned with the survival of the Hadzabe in east Africa. The most respected Hadzabe elders have given their request to our organisation to submit a paper to express the severity of the situation facing the Hadzabe, (singular: Hadza). Along with the Sandawe they are the last remaining aboriginal tribes, of click lout speaking peoples in eastern Africa.