SILENT EPIDEMIC An indigenous Hadzabe man (above) emerges from his hut. According to latest reports from Manyara Region, hundreds of tribesmen are being driven to an early grave by a deadly cocktail of famine and disease. dying each year.
Arusha
ABOUT 100 Hadzabe bushmen -- the last remaining group of the ancient tribe of hunter-gatherers in Tanzania ? are reported to be dying each year due to a fatal combination of drought and disease, it has been suggested.
The Hadzabe, who reside within the Yaeda-Chini valley in Mbulu District, Manyara Region, now number less than 2,000 in population and have been drastically declining every year.
’’There are about 1,800 of us living in Yaeda at the moment,’’ said Mandege Naftal Jonga, an educated Hadzabe man who both lives and conducts research in the valley.
According to Jonga, the bushmen population at Yaeda was more than 5,000 about three decades ago, but declined by 3,200 ever since mostly through untimely deaths brought about by epidemics such as drought and diseases.
With over 3,000 tribesmen dead within 30 years, this translates into 106 deaths of the Hadzabe people every year.
Two more bushmen died within this month, he said. At the moment five children are seriously ill.
’’In 1977 Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere toured the Yaeda Valley and all important data concerning the bushmen, including their population, was compiled,’’ he said.
Apparently the late Mwalimu is so far the only president who had ever visited the Yaeda Valley.
In fact, there is such isolation and ignorance at the area that most of the Hadzabe people actually think that Nyerere, who died in 1999, was still the president of Tanzania.
Kriti Gimbi an old Hadzabe bushman, fondly remembers the former leader as he ’used to send them food’ whenever there was famine. His wife Ntale Nzale believes Nyerere was a ’prophet.’
After Nyerere’s visit to the home of the bushmen in 1977, the Haydom Lutheran Hospital began taking care of the bushmen by providing them with medical services through regular outreach clinics and food aid. Reports from Mbulu however, reveal that both Haydom and other humanitarian organizations have been barred from sending such assistance into the valley.
The Mbulu Member of Parliament, Philip Marmo, who is also the Minister of State in the President’s Office (Good Governance), refuted the allegations that the Hadzabe were being systematically starved to death.
’’Nobody can refuse people from sending food to the Hadzabe,’’ he declared. But the area’s district executive director, Naijaijai Koila, declined to either comment or meet the press.
A visit by THISDAY at the Sanola area, deep in the Yaeda jungle, found a group of bushmen mostly women, gathered together under a huge baobab tree, nursing about five sick children from what seemed to be high fever. They were lying in the shade, covered with animal hides.
An old Hadzabe lady, Tale Mudendee, said she was grieving the death of two old men who had died within in the past few weeks. She named them as Mbogosh and Endeku both being brothers from the Washema clan.
’’We are starving, all the animals have disappeared and we, the Hadzabe, only feed on meat,’’ Kriti Gimbi explained through an interpreter. His wife, Ntale Nzale, said the family’s meal for the day was a tin of maize flour that would be mixed with water and fed to the youngest children.
From: ThisDay (Tanzania)
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