Bullets and guns: The expensive cattle rearing culture in banditry-prone Baringo

The dry spells when pasture is depleted and they have to drive cattle further afield are their most challenging time.

Besides being armed with general rules on how to navigate the terrain and make sure the animals get the best out of an impossible situation, the youngsters are required to have something else -- a gun.

Given the incessant banditry attacks, often during the dry season when the cattle are moved in search of pasture, the gun is the difference between losing all your father’s herd, or going home a hero.

Matter of life and death 

“Owning livestock in this part of the world is a matter of life and death. If you are not armed, then count yourself at risk of being turned pauper overnight, if you will be lucky to be alive, because criminals from neighbouring communities may invade and steal all the livestock,” said Arupe.

It is, therefore, easier, Arupe, not his real name, figures, to sell some of his cattle to equip his sons with the tools to protect the rest of the herd.

In the absence of effective and accessible state security in these areas, small arms are naturally seen as a guarantee of security.

This is the life of thousands of locals in the insecurity prone areas in the North Rift region, where proliferation of illegal guns has been a hindrance to economic development over the years, with communities impoverished after investing thousands of shillings on expensive guns and bullets.

The ripple effect is the draining of their resources, with several people killed and amenities closed or vandalised by armed criminals due to banditry and livestock theft.

The movement of illegal guns in the country happen in secret and are difficult to document because most of the weapons entering Kenya appear to be trickling in or are carried by small-time traders, accounting for a steady arms influx.

Given this life and death decision, residents of Baringo, Turkana, Samburu, West Pokot, Laikipia and Elgeyo Marakwet counties spend a fortune on firearms and bullets to sustain the age-old custom of livestock theft, and banditry to ‘protect’ themselves -- a situation that has impoverished most families who have to sell their livestock to buy the guns.

The guns do not come cheap, selling from Sh80,000 to 100,000 on the black market, while ammunition is sold at Sh100 to 200 each depending on different areas.

According to Mr Julius Akeno, an elder from Tiaty Sub-County, the costs shoot up since boys as young as eight—the age ripe to be herders — are required to have a piece following training on how to use the firearm.

“You can imagine a situation where a family has five sons or more, who have attained the age of being a herder. Each must have a gun and ammunition, which are not cheap,” said Mr Akeno, who has authored a book, Patrons of Wild Suguta Valley.

Important trade commodity 

Often illiterate herd boys are trained at an early age on how to defend themselves. They are separated from their mothers as young as eight and taken to herding camps where they are subjected to hardships. The boys must learn survival skills to be sharp and hardy.

“These communities have a lot of livestock, some of them being proceeds of banditry but they end up selling almost all of them to acquire more guns and perhaps, ammunition which they must have at any time,” said Mr Akeno.

To defend their livestock -- their source of income and pride, families often have to choose between guns and the basic necessities for those left at home, and the guns always win.

“Back home, women and children left behind when the men go into battle fields live in squalid conditions, some having to go without a meal for days. It is double tragedy if their husbands or sons are killed in the process and all the livestock stolen, which is common in the pastoralist communities,” Mr Akeno explained.

In some areas, especially on the borders, guns are so common that they are carried openly. They have become an important trade commodity and provide a means for competing groups to assert and expand territorial control.

Akeno raised concern that some families in the volatile borders in the region choose to own a gun(s) rather than even providing basic needs to their families or venture in development.

“More guns to them mean enhanced security and there is no way they can take their livestock to another person’s territory without it because they will be susceptible to attacks,” he added.

But if guns are expensive, them being in working condition — which means having readily-available bullets — is even more expensive.

In a raid, there can be more than 100 armed men, each of whom has a cache of bullets, which cost between Sh100 and Sh200 each.

Endless arms race 

In his book, Mr Akeno describes this rush for arms, and the need to have the guns as an endless arms race that only drain what little resources these communities have in a cycle of despair, guns, and bullets.

“What is the future of such people? Do you see where we are heading? Recurrent droughts are not giving us a break and it has been taking many of our livestock, with the guns and bullets that we buy being expensive, draining our economy. They are taking away our lives and reducing our populations. Might it be that we unknowingly support other people’s businesses with our sweat and blood and with our lives and become miserable as each day passes?” Mr Akeno asks in the book.

Mr Richard Chepchomei from Chemoe in Baringo North regretted that cattle rustling had moved from the cultural connotation of bride price — with suitors having to steal to get their bride — to an ugly, organised crime.

Even worse, children are turned into herders instead of going to school like those in other parts of the country, Mr Chepchomei said, a situation that keeps fanning insecurity with the twin effects of young boys recruited into banditry and young girls married off at a tender age.

“When will such people concentrate on educating their children when their focus is smuggling illegal guns and engaging in cattle raids? They raise a generation that is illiterate who will just be acquainted with the guns and what is happening around them. The end result is high poverty and illiteracy levels,” said Mr Chepchomei.

In such volatile areas, it is no surprise to have only a few men aged between 15 and 30 — the prime age of cattle rustling and herding — because they die in attacks.

Punishment 

Mr Judah Losutan, an elder from Nginyang’ in Tiaty West said the possession of illegal arms has led to a strict code of punishment that further perpetuates poverty.

If any member of the community kills a fellow member, whether intentionally or accidentally, they undergo lapai, a punishment.

“During the lapai, livestock belonging to the whole clan of the perpetrator is driven away by elders and given to the victim’s family. Their houses are then torched. There is no specific number of livestock to be taken, so they make sure they have rendered the whole clan paupers by taking away everything,” explained Mr Losutan.

If someone from the community kills a person from another community, we were told, no such punishment befalls them. They are, however, taken through a cleansing ceremony and barred from interacting with others for a month, after which they are permitted to take part in another raid.

According to Colonel (Rtd) Moses Kwonyike, proliferation of firearms has also forced communities to live in remote villages, away from social amenities, to hide from authorities.

“The young men (bandits) who have been named by government officials move several villages away from their homes and start their own families in the far flung villages, where there are no amenities including schools and health centres. Their relatives will not know what they are doing as some can be gone for several years. People only receive reports of their being killed in a raid,” said the ex-soldier, who also served as a military adviser for the United Nations (UN) African Mission in Darfur.

Rift Valley regional coordinator George Natembeya recently claimed that during the ongoing security operation to mop up illegal guns and smoke out criminals, some people asked the government to pay them more than Sh100,000 so that they can part with the arms.

“This is an indication that these people value those guns and are not willing to surrender them. How can the government reward people in possession of illegal arms? I suspect they wanted to take the money, surrender the guns then go and procure new ones from the proceeds,” said Mr Natembeya.

Even those that did surrender their firearm, Mr Natembeya said, withheld their bullets, raising concern that they might be having other guns at home.

He also hinted that those who own guns are poor young men who are being funded by prominent politicians in the region.

“There are prominent people in the pastoralist communities who own a large number of livestock and they hire young men by buying them guns to herd. There are high chances that those carrying the guns did not buy them, someone bought the guns for them for their own vested interests,” said Mr Natembeya.

The criminal enterprises, he said, organise with unscrupulous traders to buy the stolen livestock in Nairobi, Naivasha, Nakuru, Eldoret and other major towns at very low prices -- between Sh7,000 and Sh8,000 a cow, with the traders making huge margins once they sell the meat.

Disarmament plan 

Keen to eradicate this menace, the government has rolled out a massive disarmament in Baringo, Turkana, Samburu and Laikipia counties in a bid to seize illegal guns, smoke out criminals and recover stolen livestock.

Proliferation of small arms is associated not only with escalating cattle raids, but also with greater banditry and insecurity on roads and killings in villages.

Warfare and cattle rustling among communities in the arid and semi-arid areas in Kenya date back to pre-colonial times with the aim being to expand territory by pastoralist groups such as the Maasai, the Pokot, and the Turkana.

The increased proliferation of sophisticated automatic rifles such as the AK-47 has, however, changed the nature of cattle rustling, entrenching it in other communities such as the Ilchamus, Tugen, Samburu and Marakwet in the North Rift region.

While in previous decades, the stolen livestock was redistributed or used to pay bride price, cattle rustling has more recently become commercialised. Stolen livestock have been sold, often across international borders.

Armed attacks can unleash a never ending cycle of revenge attacks, escalating the acquisition of arms among rival communities.

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