Hope for unity among Isiolo pastoral communities as elders hold peace talks
Members of the Borana, Samburu, Turkana and Meru communities during a past peace meeting. Borana community members met on Sunday to establish a joint forum and action plans as a key step in peace-building in the northern region.
What you need to know:
- The different teams are also seeking to ensure forgiveness and reconciliation prevails between the communities.
- The groups decided to take up the initiative themselves citing inaction by security agencies in the mainly pastoralist region.
- Nasuulu Conservancy chairman Omar Godana said clashes in Isiolo have affected trade and social life.
- The official singled out Ngaremara, Tractor and Archers Post as areas hardest hit by insecurity.
Efforts to bring lasting peace in Isiolo got a boost Wednesday after elders started holding reconciliation meetings to consolidate unity in the county which has experienced conflicts.
The clashes have for many months led to the loss of lives and property, leaving the warring pastoralist communities of Turkana, Borana, Meru and Samburu impoverished.
The different teams are also seeking to ensure forgiveness and reconciliation prevails between the communities.
The Borana, Somali, and Njuri Ncheke elders as well as officials from the Northern Rangeland Trust (NRT) and African Development Solutions (Adeso) have started a series of peace meetings to help in tackling cattle rustling which they say is the main cause of underdevelopment.
The groups decided to take up the initiative themselves citing inaction by security agencies in the mainly pastoralist region.
Nasuulu Conservancy chairman Omar Godana said clashes in Isiolo have affected trade and social life.
Mr Godana who spoke Wednesday at a peace meeting in Ngaremara and Archers Post said previous attacks have claimed about 30 lives since April 2015.
Many others, he added, have been left with serious injuries.
FIGHT OVER WATER, PASTURE
“The pastoralist communities residing in Isiolo and Samburu East have engaged in battles over cattle, pastures and water.
“Security personnel are also slow to respond to these attacks. All stakeholders should hold regular meetings to avert this,” Mr Godana said.
The official singled out Ngaremara, Tractor and Archers Post as areas hardest hit by insecurity.
Commuters traveling along the Moyale-Isiolo route that passes through these areas have always been stranded when cases of insecurity are reported as they fear bandit attacks.
In Meru, the County Peace and Conflict Resolution group asked the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC) to immediately start civic education to enable residents to understand the importance of peaceful coexistence.
Speaking in Maburwa Village in Tigania East during the burial of John Baringu who was killed by cattle rustlers on September 27, 2015, the lobby’s chairman Charles Kamwibua said it was only through preaching peace that the attacks would stop.
“I met the NCIC commissioners last Monday and told them about what we are undergoing in Meru’s northern grazing zones and our neighbouring counties.
“They should visit the affected areas and educate all the communities involved and bring us together to stop these endless killings,” Mr Kamwibua said.
