Síntesis del caso: los museos de Portugal.

Most literature has tended to discuss the root causes of pastoralist raids on competition over natural resources due to droughts and the impact of climate change and thus reiterate the environmental security/scarcity debate (see Witsenburg and Adano 2009). However, cattle raids are far more complex and go beyond resource scarcity. Pastoral raids must be seen within the larger context of political, social, resource and ethnic context. This is because their causes as well as the actors involve political, social, resource and ethnic cleavages. McCabe (2004) noted that raiding is a response to political as well as environmental events and not just scarcity. Thus there is a political ecology angle within which cattle raiding in Kenya should be understood. In the literature, the underlying root causes of raiding have been found by many scholars to emanate from poverty, payment of dowry, accumulation of general wealth, retaliation and culture of revenge, the lucrative cross-border cattle trade, availability and easy access to small arms,

123 climate change and resource scarcity, ethnic rivalries and politics (Bollig 1993; Fleisher 2000; Krätli and Swift 2003; McCabe 2004; Mkutu 2006; Eaton 2008; Witsenburg and Adano 2009; Schilling et al. 2012).

Schilling and Akuno (2012) studied raids between the Turkana and the Pokot found that raiders reason for engaging in raiding among Turkana were “hunger”, “drought” and “wealth” while the Pokot named payment of dowry, wealth and the defending or expansion of territory. The availability of small arms in Kenya makes raiding more frequent and violent (Mkutu 2008). Raids between the Turkana and the Pokot for instance have involved the use of sophisticated arms. Krätli and Swift (1999) in their study found that some actors could play multiple roles which can fuel conflicts:

“…Of course, the (roles of the actors) may overlap. Individual raiders may engage in illegal trade with looted guns. Cattle traders may also be elders, politicians or administrators, and so may weapon dealers. Security forces may trade in weapons. Politicians may have interests in national/international business. Any of these may have a herd of their own, which may be built up by raiding, or be reduced by being raided by others.” (Krätli and Swift 1999:7)

Thus various actors who do not physically take part in raids covertly fund and support raids for their interest. This is why Eaton (2008) says thatcattle raiding is perpetuated and aided by local big men with connections to local administrations and national government. Bond (2012) drawing on her study among the Samburu and Pokot groups in Laikipia, captured the role of elites in cattle raids in the following manner:

“A central point to conflict in Laikipia and Kenya generally is the position of elites, often politicians, in manipulating power dynamics and creating communicative strategies and discourses which serve their own interests. Many respondents in this study said that the politicians are heavily involved not only in the arming but also purposively marginalising their own constituents in order to maintain their dominating power within the political and business arenas” (Bond 2012: 6)

124 In this study elites are defined as influential people within pastoralists’ societies by virtue of their political, administrative or financial capabilities who use these capacities to influence the behavior of warriors by hiring warriors to conduct cattle raids on their behalf for commercial or political reasons. In the context of Baragoi, elites are chiefs, Members of County Assemblies (MCAs), former councilors, businessmen, teachers, civil servants, Members of Parliament, Senators, Ward Administrators, Constituency Development Fund (CDF) managers and other members of these pastoralists groups who nolonger draw their primary surivival from pastoralism but retain substantial herds in their home areas through hired labour of extended family members. Further, elite in this context also include security personnel who are not necessarily from pastoralists’ communities but are involved covertly in the trade of raided livestock.

The prominent role of elites in conflicts among pastoralists in Northern Kenya is notable in recent literature and newspaper pieces. Leff (2009), Mkutu (2016:18) and Daily Nation (2012) all allude to the trend in which influential members of pastoralists societies increasingly use their financial and political influence to sponsor raids by paying warriors or by purchasing arms and ammunition for raids. The role of devolved public funds in funding cattle raids in Turkana was also captured in newspaper articles where a Member of Parliament was accused of diverting public funds for these purposes (Daily Nation 2012). This is similar to my own field experience in Baragoi where interviews62 with security officers revealed the complicity of public fund personnel in using state vehicles to distribute ammunition in the run up to heightened tension and subsequent violence among the Samburu and Turkana in December 2014. Elites who fuel violent confrontations among the Samburu and Turkana of Baragoi in pursuit of their personal interests such as votes or business opportunities often portray themselves as community spokespersons and their agendas as communal. This enables the mobilization of warriors as a political force aimed at meting violence at perceived opposition voters under the pretext of ‘protection politics’. CEWARN (2004:25) noted the prominent role that these elites play in fuelling violence in Northern Kenya. In interviews among the Borana and Rendille of Marsabit, Scott-Villiers et al (2014) were informed of the role of local teachers in fundraising for violence as follows:

125 “At the moment some teachers are going round the villages collecting KShs. One thousand from everybody both male and female to buy guns. They have been doing this for about three months now - since we are part of them it is difficult for them to hide from us” (Scott-Villiers et al 2014:22)

Elites therefore contribute significantly to violence among pastoralists in Northern Kenya in pursuit of their interests to capture and preserve their own economic and political power especially in areas where competition for these two forms of power is between two distinct ethinic groups. Apart from providing logistical support through purchase of arms, elites organise the means of transport usually lorries to ferry warriors to the place of violence.