women without a blanket. the effects of land grabbing in
TRANSCRIPT
African Studies One-Year Master Degree Thesis
15 Credits Second Cycle Level 1
Women Without a Blanket The Effects of Land Grabbing in Tanzania Between Policies and Rights
Author Sara Chianchiano
Supervisor Judith NarroweExternal Examiner Maria Ericson Subjectmain field of study African StudiesCourse code AS3013Credits 15Date of examination 21062021
At Dalarna University it is possible to publish the student thesis in full text in DiVA The publishingis open access which means the work will be freely accessible to read and download on the internetThis will significantly increase the dissemination and visibility of the student thesis
Open access is becoming the standard route for spreading scientific and academic information on the internet Dalarna University recommends that both researchers as well as students publish their work open access
I give mywe give our consent for full text publishing (freely accessible on the internet open access)
Yes No
Dalarna University ndash SE-791 88 Falun ndash Phone +4623-77 80 00
Abstract
Land is a fundamental resource both as a source of livelihood and as a symbol of identity and
belonging This is threatened by a global phenomenon land grabbing the practice of acquiring and
investing in land on a large scale often enabled by national policies Land grabbing erodes peoplersquos
land rights and in particular womenrsquos rights In Tanzania marginalisation leads women to be more
vulnerable not only through the loss of land ndash the blanket ndash but as the main targets of witchcraft
accusations The latter often arise within land disputes where litigants might resort to accusation to
prevent the woman from claiming her right to land This thesis aims to explore the effects of land
grabbing on social and gender relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these
effects
Keywords land grabbing marginalisation policies rights witchcraft women
Table of Contents
1 Introduction5
11 Overview5
12 Objective and Research Questions7
13 Background and Relevance8
2 Pathways to Research10
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts10
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights11212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty13
22 Methodology and Source Materials14
23 State of Research16
3 The Land of Witches18
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview18
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 202021312 Meeting Local Communities24
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present25
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 202027322 Meeting Ethnic Groups30
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty33
331 Does less Land equals more Witches33332 Witch Hunt or War on Women36
4 The Land of All39
41 Land as a Blanket40
42 Women Rights and Policies42
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo45
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land46432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo49
5 Conclusions52
Bibliography55
Sitography57
Appendix60
Table of Figures
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202023
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202028
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202029
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202034
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202035
Abbreviations
FAO Food and Agricultural Organisation
ILC International Land Coalition
IMF International Monetary Found
LHRC Legal and Human Rights Centre
LSLA Large-Scale Land Acquisition
MVIWATA Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania
NGO Non-Governmental Organisation
OHCHR United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner
PAICODEO Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation
PWC Pastoral Women Council
SAP Structural Adjustment Programme
SDGs Sustainable Development Goals
TALA Tanzania Land Alliance
TAWLA Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
TIC Tanzania Investment Centre
UN United Nations
WLAC Women Legal Aid Centre
0
1 Introduction
11 Overview
In Tanzania in 2018 437 percent of land was used for agricultural purposes1 According to the Food
and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) ldquoover 75 of Tanzanians live in rural
areas where agriculture and agriculture-related activities are crucial to their livelihoodrdquo2 as well as to
the countryrsquos economy Land is a fundamental resource and will continue to be so both as a source of
livelihood and as a symbol of identity and belonging Community and family lands are often referred
to as ancestral land symbolic of a bond that transcends time while remaining tied to a single space
What does it happen then when land becomes a commodity An asset that can be sold and acquired
on a large scale During the 1990s after the end of the Ujamaa (Tanzanian Socialism)
the international neo-liberal economic policy agendas of Hernando de Soto3 (2000) and the World Bank became a major driving force behind African government policies for the marketisation and formalisation of land tenure Such policies emphasised the benefits of privatisation and land titling for economic growth individual tenure security and the realisation of capital4
The end of Julius Nyererersquos regime in 1984 is simultaneously the end and the beginning of an ongoing
transition from socialism ndash when ldquonational policies discouraged foreign investment and private
accumulationrdquo5 ndash to liberalism ndash when ldquoprivate investment and property rights began to be
encouraged including promotion of foreign investment in line with doctrinaire structural adjustment
policiesrdquo6 Although already highly criticise for high rates of corruption and dysfunctionalism the
overturning of the national political and economic direction has led to a subsequent social change
with rural villages and communities facing states of uncertainty in socio-economic terms
Privatisation of land tenure further triggered the elaboration of strategies to deal with this sense of
uncertainty pervasive throughout the African continent where ldquothe scale and impact various
kinds of catastrophehas been disproportionately huge in recent timesrdquo7 lsquoCatastrophersquo comes from
the Greek verb καταστρέϕω which means lsquooverturnrsquo In mathematics it indicates the breaking of an
equilibrium but in everyday life it is generally used to describe a drastic and sudden event negatively
affecting a society or a state in an almost irreversible way However I argue that the use of
lsquocatastrophicrsquo tends in the long term to mystify the causes that led to the catastrophe in the African
1 World Fact Book Tanzania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
2 Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website] httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
3 ldquoHernando de Soto Polar or Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian neoliberal economist known for his work on the informal economy and on the importance of business and property rights He is one of the main supporters of introducing neoliberalism in lsquodeveloping countriesrsquo which takes he form of property right and titling of landrdquo Wikipedia ldquoHernando de Sotordquo httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Soto_28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021) 4 H Dancer Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015 p 25 F Nelson E Sulle and E Lekaita ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in Tanzaniardquo International
Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Corrnell University 2012 p 3 6 Ibid p 5 7 L Haram and CB Yamba ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in L Haram and C
B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 p 11
1
context there have been several tipping of balances introduced by specific policies thought by social
economic and political actors Emblematic are European colonialism and the related cooperation by
local authorities as well as the fall of African socialist regimes following the adoption of Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the
pervasive internal corruption dramatic social inequalities and fragmented development The sources
of the catastrophes are visible as are the consequences What has been seen and largely shown is the
disintegration of the social fabric mirrored for instance by the increase in land disputes and land
conflicts within households neighbours or communities at large
Another clearly visible consequence is gender inequality fuelled and perpetrated by marginalisation
and resulting in discrimination against women First ldquothere are social and economic inequalities that
increasingly separate individualsrsquo abilities to access and buy land in the age of newly liberalised
African land marketsrdquo8 and women are emblematic in this sense Women face discrimination in terms
of rights land inheritance property and ownership because gender equality is neither legally
interiorised at the justice level nor socially at the cultural level Second their economic status often
depends on their social status whether they are still married or widows whether they have children or
not whether they can count on solid relational networks The role of women transcends individuality
as long as they are flanked by men be it a husband an eldest son a brother-in-law a father or the
clan elders Once they have lost the lsquosupportrsquo of these figures the woman is now only an individual
And it is here that her vulnerability emerges at her husbandrsquos death at her resistance against the
expropriation of rights and goods the woman can potentially lose everything A woman can be
ostracised from her community or lose her life In Tanzania behind of both prospects there is often an
accusation of witchcraft The following story will clarify the extent of this aspect
Ruth Zacharia is a Tanzanian widow who was accused of witchcraft and attacked in her house by
three people armed with machetes The reason for the attack was a land dispute In 2017 Reuters
reported her story through her own words
ldquoThey said lsquoWe have been sent by our mother because you killed our father so that you could buy that landrsquordquo the 63-year old recalled fidgeting with her stiff scarred right hand
ldquoI said lsquoI am not a witchrsquoThey started cutting me all overrdquo
[hellip]
Zachariarsquos troubles began after she bought an acre of land in 2011 near her home in Tanzaniarsquos western Magu District
Another family wanted the land but they were unable to pay for the entire two-acre plot after their father died So the vendor split it between the two families who knew each other through the local church
Zacharia planted rice on her portion but the other familyrsquos cows trampled it One night she woke to seeflames outside her window as petrol had been doused over the three overhanging her house Finally she was attacked9
8 Dancer 2015 p 52
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
Abstract
Land is a fundamental resource both as a source of livelihood and as a symbol of identity and
belonging This is threatened by a global phenomenon land grabbing the practice of acquiring and
investing in land on a large scale often enabled by national policies Land grabbing erodes peoplersquos
land rights and in particular womenrsquos rights In Tanzania marginalisation leads women to be more
vulnerable not only through the loss of land ndash the blanket ndash but as the main targets of witchcraft
accusations The latter often arise within land disputes where litigants might resort to accusation to
prevent the woman from claiming her right to land This thesis aims to explore the effects of land
grabbing on social and gender relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these
effects
Keywords land grabbing marginalisation policies rights witchcraft women
Table of Contents
1 Introduction5
11 Overview5
12 Objective and Research Questions7
13 Background and Relevance8
2 Pathways to Research10
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts10
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights11212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty13
22 Methodology and Source Materials14
23 State of Research16
3 The Land of Witches18
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview18
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 202021312 Meeting Local Communities24
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present25
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 202027322 Meeting Ethnic Groups30
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty33
331 Does less Land equals more Witches33332 Witch Hunt or War on Women36
4 The Land of All39
41 Land as a Blanket40
42 Women Rights and Policies42
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo45
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land46432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo49
5 Conclusions52
Bibliography55
Sitography57
Appendix60
Table of Figures
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202023
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202028
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202029
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202034
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202035
Abbreviations
FAO Food and Agricultural Organisation
ILC International Land Coalition
IMF International Monetary Found
LHRC Legal and Human Rights Centre
LSLA Large-Scale Land Acquisition
MVIWATA Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania
NGO Non-Governmental Organisation
OHCHR United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner
PAICODEO Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation
PWC Pastoral Women Council
SAP Structural Adjustment Programme
SDGs Sustainable Development Goals
TALA Tanzania Land Alliance
TAWLA Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
TIC Tanzania Investment Centre
UN United Nations
WLAC Women Legal Aid Centre
0
1 Introduction
11 Overview
In Tanzania in 2018 437 percent of land was used for agricultural purposes1 According to the Food
and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) ldquoover 75 of Tanzanians live in rural
areas where agriculture and agriculture-related activities are crucial to their livelihoodrdquo2 as well as to
the countryrsquos economy Land is a fundamental resource and will continue to be so both as a source of
livelihood and as a symbol of identity and belonging Community and family lands are often referred
to as ancestral land symbolic of a bond that transcends time while remaining tied to a single space
What does it happen then when land becomes a commodity An asset that can be sold and acquired
on a large scale During the 1990s after the end of the Ujamaa (Tanzanian Socialism)
the international neo-liberal economic policy agendas of Hernando de Soto3 (2000) and the World Bank became a major driving force behind African government policies for the marketisation and formalisation of land tenure Such policies emphasised the benefits of privatisation and land titling for economic growth individual tenure security and the realisation of capital4
The end of Julius Nyererersquos regime in 1984 is simultaneously the end and the beginning of an ongoing
transition from socialism ndash when ldquonational policies discouraged foreign investment and private
accumulationrdquo5 ndash to liberalism ndash when ldquoprivate investment and property rights began to be
encouraged including promotion of foreign investment in line with doctrinaire structural adjustment
policiesrdquo6 Although already highly criticise for high rates of corruption and dysfunctionalism the
overturning of the national political and economic direction has led to a subsequent social change
with rural villages and communities facing states of uncertainty in socio-economic terms
Privatisation of land tenure further triggered the elaboration of strategies to deal with this sense of
uncertainty pervasive throughout the African continent where ldquothe scale and impact various
kinds of catastrophehas been disproportionately huge in recent timesrdquo7 lsquoCatastrophersquo comes from
the Greek verb καταστρέϕω which means lsquooverturnrsquo In mathematics it indicates the breaking of an
equilibrium but in everyday life it is generally used to describe a drastic and sudden event negatively
affecting a society or a state in an almost irreversible way However I argue that the use of
lsquocatastrophicrsquo tends in the long term to mystify the causes that led to the catastrophe in the African
1 World Fact Book Tanzania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
2 Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website] httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
3 ldquoHernando de Soto Polar or Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian neoliberal economist known for his work on the informal economy and on the importance of business and property rights He is one of the main supporters of introducing neoliberalism in lsquodeveloping countriesrsquo which takes he form of property right and titling of landrdquo Wikipedia ldquoHernando de Sotordquo httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Soto_28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021) 4 H Dancer Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015 p 25 F Nelson E Sulle and E Lekaita ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in Tanzaniardquo International
Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Corrnell University 2012 p 3 6 Ibid p 5 7 L Haram and CB Yamba ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in L Haram and C
B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 p 11
1
context there have been several tipping of balances introduced by specific policies thought by social
economic and political actors Emblematic are European colonialism and the related cooperation by
local authorities as well as the fall of African socialist regimes following the adoption of Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the
pervasive internal corruption dramatic social inequalities and fragmented development The sources
of the catastrophes are visible as are the consequences What has been seen and largely shown is the
disintegration of the social fabric mirrored for instance by the increase in land disputes and land
conflicts within households neighbours or communities at large
Another clearly visible consequence is gender inequality fuelled and perpetrated by marginalisation
and resulting in discrimination against women First ldquothere are social and economic inequalities that
increasingly separate individualsrsquo abilities to access and buy land in the age of newly liberalised
African land marketsrdquo8 and women are emblematic in this sense Women face discrimination in terms
of rights land inheritance property and ownership because gender equality is neither legally
interiorised at the justice level nor socially at the cultural level Second their economic status often
depends on their social status whether they are still married or widows whether they have children or
not whether they can count on solid relational networks The role of women transcends individuality
as long as they are flanked by men be it a husband an eldest son a brother-in-law a father or the
clan elders Once they have lost the lsquosupportrsquo of these figures the woman is now only an individual
And it is here that her vulnerability emerges at her husbandrsquos death at her resistance against the
expropriation of rights and goods the woman can potentially lose everything A woman can be
ostracised from her community or lose her life In Tanzania behind of both prospects there is often an
accusation of witchcraft The following story will clarify the extent of this aspect
Ruth Zacharia is a Tanzanian widow who was accused of witchcraft and attacked in her house by
three people armed with machetes The reason for the attack was a land dispute In 2017 Reuters
reported her story through her own words
ldquoThey said lsquoWe have been sent by our mother because you killed our father so that you could buy that landrsquordquo the 63-year old recalled fidgeting with her stiff scarred right hand
ldquoI said lsquoI am not a witchrsquoThey started cutting me all overrdquo
[hellip]
Zachariarsquos troubles began after she bought an acre of land in 2011 near her home in Tanzaniarsquos western Magu District
Another family wanted the land but they were unable to pay for the entire two-acre plot after their father died So the vendor split it between the two families who knew each other through the local church
Zacharia planted rice on her portion but the other familyrsquos cows trampled it One night she woke to seeflames outside her window as petrol had been doused over the three overhanging her house Finally she was attacked9
8 Dancer 2015 p 52
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
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Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
Table of Contents
1 Introduction5
11 Overview5
12 Objective and Research Questions7
13 Background and Relevance8
2 Pathways to Research10
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts10
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights11212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty13
22 Methodology and Source Materials14
23 State of Research16
3 The Land of Witches18
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview18
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 202021312 Meeting Local Communities24
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present25
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 202027322 Meeting Ethnic Groups30
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty33
331 Does less Land equals more Witches33332 Witch Hunt or War on Women36
4 The Land of All39
41 Land as a Blanket40
42 Women Rights and Policies42
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo45
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land46432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo49
5 Conclusions52
Bibliography55
Sitography57
Appendix60
Table of Figures
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202023
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202028
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202029
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202034
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202035
Abbreviations
FAO Food and Agricultural Organisation
ILC International Land Coalition
IMF International Monetary Found
LHRC Legal and Human Rights Centre
LSLA Large-Scale Land Acquisition
MVIWATA Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania
NGO Non-Governmental Organisation
OHCHR United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner
PAICODEO Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation
PWC Pastoral Women Council
SAP Structural Adjustment Programme
SDGs Sustainable Development Goals
TALA Tanzania Land Alliance
TAWLA Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
TIC Tanzania Investment Centre
UN United Nations
WLAC Women Legal Aid Centre
0
1 Introduction
11 Overview
In Tanzania in 2018 437 percent of land was used for agricultural purposes1 According to the Food
and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) ldquoover 75 of Tanzanians live in rural
areas where agriculture and agriculture-related activities are crucial to their livelihoodrdquo2 as well as to
the countryrsquos economy Land is a fundamental resource and will continue to be so both as a source of
livelihood and as a symbol of identity and belonging Community and family lands are often referred
to as ancestral land symbolic of a bond that transcends time while remaining tied to a single space
What does it happen then when land becomes a commodity An asset that can be sold and acquired
on a large scale During the 1990s after the end of the Ujamaa (Tanzanian Socialism)
the international neo-liberal economic policy agendas of Hernando de Soto3 (2000) and the World Bank became a major driving force behind African government policies for the marketisation and formalisation of land tenure Such policies emphasised the benefits of privatisation and land titling for economic growth individual tenure security and the realisation of capital4
The end of Julius Nyererersquos regime in 1984 is simultaneously the end and the beginning of an ongoing
transition from socialism ndash when ldquonational policies discouraged foreign investment and private
accumulationrdquo5 ndash to liberalism ndash when ldquoprivate investment and property rights began to be
encouraged including promotion of foreign investment in line with doctrinaire structural adjustment
policiesrdquo6 Although already highly criticise for high rates of corruption and dysfunctionalism the
overturning of the national political and economic direction has led to a subsequent social change
with rural villages and communities facing states of uncertainty in socio-economic terms
Privatisation of land tenure further triggered the elaboration of strategies to deal with this sense of
uncertainty pervasive throughout the African continent where ldquothe scale and impact various
kinds of catastrophehas been disproportionately huge in recent timesrdquo7 lsquoCatastrophersquo comes from
the Greek verb καταστρέϕω which means lsquooverturnrsquo In mathematics it indicates the breaking of an
equilibrium but in everyday life it is generally used to describe a drastic and sudden event negatively
affecting a society or a state in an almost irreversible way However I argue that the use of
lsquocatastrophicrsquo tends in the long term to mystify the causes that led to the catastrophe in the African
1 World Fact Book Tanzania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
2 Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website] httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
3 ldquoHernando de Soto Polar or Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian neoliberal economist known for his work on the informal economy and on the importance of business and property rights He is one of the main supporters of introducing neoliberalism in lsquodeveloping countriesrsquo which takes he form of property right and titling of landrdquo Wikipedia ldquoHernando de Sotordquo httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Soto_28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021) 4 H Dancer Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015 p 25 F Nelson E Sulle and E Lekaita ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in Tanzaniardquo International
Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Corrnell University 2012 p 3 6 Ibid p 5 7 L Haram and CB Yamba ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in L Haram and C
B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 p 11
1
context there have been several tipping of balances introduced by specific policies thought by social
economic and political actors Emblematic are European colonialism and the related cooperation by
local authorities as well as the fall of African socialist regimes following the adoption of Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the
pervasive internal corruption dramatic social inequalities and fragmented development The sources
of the catastrophes are visible as are the consequences What has been seen and largely shown is the
disintegration of the social fabric mirrored for instance by the increase in land disputes and land
conflicts within households neighbours or communities at large
Another clearly visible consequence is gender inequality fuelled and perpetrated by marginalisation
and resulting in discrimination against women First ldquothere are social and economic inequalities that
increasingly separate individualsrsquo abilities to access and buy land in the age of newly liberalised
African land marketsrdquo8 and women are emblematic in this sense Women face discrimination in terms
of rights land inheritance property and ownership because gender equality is neither legally
interiorised at the justice level nor socially at the cultural level Second their economic status often
depends on their social status whether they are still married or widows whether they have children or
not whether they can count on solid relational networks The role of women transcends individuality
as long as they are flanked by men be it a husband an eldest son a brother-in-law a father or the
clan elders Once they have lost the lsquosupportrsquo of these figures the woman is now only an individual
And it is here that her vulnerability emerges at her husbandrsquos death at her resistance against the
expropriation of rights and goods the woman can potentially lose everything A woman can be
ostracised from her community or lose her life In Tanzania behind of both prospects there is often an
accusation of witchcraft The following story will clarify the extent of this aspect
Ruth Zacharia is a Tanzanian widow who was accused of witchcraft and attacked in her house by
three people armed with machetes The reason for the attack was a land dispute In 2017 Reuters
reported her story through her own words
ldquoThey said lsquoWe have been sent by our mother because you killed our father so that you could buy that landrsquordquo the 63-year old recalled fidgeting with her stiff scarred right hand
ldquoI said lsquoI am not a witchrsquoThey started cutting me all overrdquo
[hellip]
Zachariarsquos troubles began after she bought an acre of land in 2011 near her home in Tanzaniarsquos western Magu District
Another family wanted the land but they were unable to pay for the entire two-acre plot after their father died So the vendor split it between the two families who knew each other through the local church
Zacharia planted rice on her portion but the other familyrsquos cows trampled it One night she woke to seeflames outside her window as petrol had been doused over the three overhanging her house Finally she was attacked9
8 Dancer 2015 p 52
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
Table of Figures
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 202022
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202023
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202028
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 202029
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202034
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 202035
Abbreviations
FAO Food and Agricultural Organisation
ILC International Land Coalition
IMF International Monetary Found
LHRC Legal and Human Rights Centre
LSLA Large-Scale Land Acquisition
MVIWATA Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania
NGO Non-Governmental Organisation
OHCHR United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner
PAICODEO Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation
PWC Pastoral Women Council
SAP Structural Adjustment Programme
SDGs Sustainable Development Goals
TALA Tanzania Land Alliance
TAWLA Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
TIC Tanzania Investment Centre
UN United Nations
WLAC Women Legal Aid Centre
0
1 Introduction
11 Overview
In Tanzania in 2018 437 percent of land was used for agricultural purposes1 According to the Food
and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) ldquoover 75 of Tanzanians live in rural
areas where agriculture and agriculture-related activities are crucial to their livelihoodrdquo2 as well as to
the countryrsquos economy Land is a fundamental resource and will continue to be so both as a source of
livelihood and as a symbol of identity and belonging Community and family lands are often referred
to as ancestral land symbolic of a bond that transcends time while remaining tied to a single space
What does it happen then when land becomes a commodity An asset that can be sold and acquired
on a large scale During the 1990s after the end of the Ujamaa (Tanzanian Socialism)
the international neo-liberal economic policy agendas of Hernando de Soto3 (2000) and the World Bank became a major driving force behind African government policies for the marketisation and formalisation of land tenure Such policies emphasised the benefits of privatisation and land titling for economic growth individual tenure security and the realisation of capital4
The end of Julius Nyererersquos regime in 1984 is simultaneously the end and the beginning of an ongoing
transition from socialism ndash when ldquonational policies discouraged foreign investment and private
accumulationrdquo5 ndash to liberalism ndash when ldquoprivate investment and property rights began to be
encouraged including promotion of foreign investment in line with doctrinaire structural adjustment
policiesrdquo6 Although already highly criticise for high rates of corruption and dysfunctionalism the
overturning of the national political and economic direction has led to a subsequent social change
with rural villages and communities facing states of uncertainty in socio-economic terms
Privatisation of land tenure further triggered the elaboration of strategies to deal with this sense of
uncertainty pervasive throughout the African continent where ldquothe scale and impact various
kinds of catastrophehas been disproportionately huge in recent timesrdquo7 lsquoCatastrophersquo comes from
the Greek verb καταστρέϕω which means lsquooverturnrsquo In mathematics it indicates the breaking of an
equilibrium but in everyday life it is generally used to describe a drastic and sudden event negatively
affecting a society or a state in an almost irreversible way However I argue that the use of
lsquocatastrophicrsquo tends in the long term to mystify the causes that led to the catastrophe in the African
1 World Fact Book Tanzania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
2 Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website] httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
3 ldquoHernando de Soto Polar or Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian neoliberal economist known for his work on the informal economy and on the importance of business and property rights He is one of the main supporters of introducing neoliberalism in lsquodeveloping countriesrsquo which takes he form of property right and titling of landrdquo Wikipedia ldquoHernando de Sotordquo httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Soto_28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021) 4 H Dancer Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015 p 25 F Nelson E Sulle and E Lekaita ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in Tanzaniardquo International
Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Corrnell University 2012 p 3 6 Ibid p 5 7 L Haram and CB Yamba ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in L Haram and C
B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 p 11
1
context there have been several tipping of balances introduced by specific policies thought by social
economic and political actors Emblematic are European colonialism and the related cooperation by
local authorities as well as the fall of African socialist regimes following the adoption of Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the
pervasive internal corruption dramatic social inequalities and fragmented development The sources
of the catastrophes are visible as are the consequences What has been seen and largely shown is the
disintegration of the social fabric mirrored for instance by the increase in land disputes and land
conflicts within households neighbours or communities at large
Another clearly visible consequence is gender inequality fuelled and perpetrated by marginalisation
and resulting in discrimination against women First ldquothere are social and economic inequalities that
increasingly separate individualsrsquo abilities to access and buy land in the age of newly liberalised
African land marketsrdquo8 and women are emblematic in this sense Women face discrimination in terms
of rights land inheritance property and ownership because gender equality is neither legally
interiorised at the justice level nor socially at the cultural level Second their economic status often
depends on their social status whether they are still married or widows whether they have children or
not whether they can count on solid relational networks The role of women transcends individuality
as long as they are flanked by men be it a husband an eldest son a brother-in-law a father or the
clan elders Once they have lost the lsquosupportrsquo of these figures the woman is now only an individual
And it is here that her vulnerability emerges at her husbandrsquos death at her resistance against the
expropriation of rights and goods the woman can potentially lose everything A woman can be
ostracised from her community or lose her life In Tanzania behind of both prospects there is often an
accusation of witchcraft The following story will clarify the extent of this aspect
Ruth Zacharia is a Tanzanian widow who was accused of witchcraft and attacked in her house by
three people armed with machetes The reason for the attack was a land dispute In 2017 Reuters
reported her story through her own words
ldquoThey said lsquoWe have been sent by our mother because you killed our father so that you could buy that landrsquordquo the 63-year old recalled fidgeting with her stiff scarred right hand
ldquoI said lsquoI am not a witchrsquoThey started cutting me all overrdquo
[hellip]
Zachariarsquos troubles began after she bought an acre of land in 2011 near her home in Tanzaniarsquos western Magu District
Another family wanted the land but they were unable to pay for the entire two-acre plot after their father died So the vendor split it between the two families who knew each other through the local church
Zacharia planted rice on her portion but the other familyrsquos cows trampled it One night she woke to seeflames outside her window as petrol had been doused over the three overhanging her house Finally she was attacked9
8 Dancer 2015 p 52
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
1 Introduction
11 Overview
In Tanzania in 2018 437 percent of land was used for agricultural purposes1 According to the Food
and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) ldquoover 75 of Tanzanians live in rural
areas where agriculture and agriculture-related activities are crucial to their livelihoodrdquo2 as well as to
the countryrsquos economy Land is a fundamental resource and will continue to be so both as a source of
livelihood and as a symbol of identity and belonging Community and family lands are often referred
to as ancestral land symbolic of a bond that transcends time while remaining tied to a single space
What does it happen then when land becomes a commodity An asset that can be sold and acquired
on a large scale During the 1990s after the end of the Ujamaa (Tanzanian Socialism)
the international neo-liberal economic policy agendas of Hernando de Soto3 (2000) and the World Bank became a major driving force behind African government policies for the marketisation and formalisation of land tenure Such policies emphasised the benefits of privatisation and land titling for economic growth individual tenure security and the realisation of capital4
The end of Julius Nyererersquos regime in 1984 is simultaneously the end and the beginning of an ongoing
transition from socialism ndash when ldquonational policies discouraged foreign investment and private
accumulationrdquo5 ndash to liberalism ndash when ldquoprivate investment and property rights began to be
encouraged including promotion of foreign investment in line with doctrinaire structural adjustment
policiesrdquo6 Although already highly criticise for high rates of corruption and dysfunctionalism the
overturning of the national political and economic direction has led to a subsequent social change
with rural villages and communities facing states of uncertainty in socio-economic terms
Privatisation of land tenure further triggered the elaboration of strategies to deal with this sense of
uncertainty pervasive throughout the African continent where ldquothe scale and impact various
kinds of catastrophehas been disproportionately huge in recent timesrdquo7 lsquoCatastrophersquo comes from
the Greek verb καταστρέϕω which means lsquooverturnrsquo In mathematics it indicates the breaking of an
equilibrium but in everyday life it is generally used to describe a drastic and sudden event negatively
affecting a society or a state in an almost irreversible way However I argue that the use of
lsquocatastrophicrsquo tends in the long term to mystify the causes that led to the catastrophe in the African
1 World Fact Book Tanzania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
2 Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website] httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
3 ldquoHernando de Soto Polar or Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian neoliberal economist known for his work on the informal economy and on the importance of business and property rights He is one of the main supporters of introducing neoliberalism in lsquodeveloping countriesrsquo which takes he form of property right and titling of landrdquo Wikipedia ldquoHernando de Sotordquo httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Soto_28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021) 4 H Dancer Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015 p 25 F Nelson E Sulle and E Lekaita ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in Tanzaniardquo International
Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Corrnell University 2012 p 3 6 Ibid p 5 7 L Haram and CB Yamba ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in L Haram and C
B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 p 11
1
context there have been several tipping of balances introduced by specific policies thought by social
economic and political actors Emblematic are European colonialism and the related cooperation by
local authorities as well as the fall of African socialist regimes following the adoption of Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the
pervasive internal corruption dramatic social inequalities and fragmented development The sources
of the catastrophes are visible as are the consequences What has been seen and largely shown is the
disintegration of the social fabric mirrored for instance by the increase in land disputes and land
conflicts within households neighbours or communities at large
Another clearly visible consequence is gender inequality fuelled and perpetrated by marginalisation
and resulting in discrimination against women First ldquothere are social and economic inequalities that
increasingly separate individualsrsquo abilities to access and buy land in the age of newly liberalised
African land marketsrdquo8 and women are emblematic in this sense Women face discrimination in terms
of rights land inheritance property and ownership because gender equality is neither legally
interiorised at the justice level nor socially at the cultural level Second their economic status often
depends on their social status whether they are still married or widows whether they have children or
not whether they can count on solid relational networks The role of women transcends individuality
as long as they are flanked by men be it a husband an eldest son a brother-in-law a father or the
clan elders Once they have lost the lsquosupportrsquo of these figures the woman is now only an individual
And it is here that her vulnerability emerges at her husbandrsquos death at her resistance against the
expropriation of rights and goods the woman can potentially lose everything A woman can be
ostracised from her community or lose her life In Tanzania behind of both prospects there is often an
accusation of witchcraft The following story will clarify the extent of this aspect
Ruth Zacharia is a Tanzanian widow who was accused of witchcraft and attacked in her house by
three people armed with machetes The reason for the attack was a land dispute In 2017 Reuters
reported her story through her own words
ldquoThey said lsquoWe have been sent by our mother because you killed our father so that you could buy that landrsquordquo the 63-year old recalled fidgeting with her stiff scarred right hand
ldquoI said lsquoI am not a witchrsquoThey started cutting me all overrdquo
[hellip]
Zachariarsquos troubles began after she bought an acre of land in 2011 near her home in Tanzaniarsquos western Magu District
Another family wanted the land but they were unable to pay for the entire two-acre plot after their father died So the vendor split it between the two families who knew each other through the local church
Zacharia planted rice on her portion but the other familyrsquos cows trampled it One night she woke to seeflames outside her window as petrol had been doused over the three overhanging her house Finally she was attacked9
8 Dancer 2015 p 52
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
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Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
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Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
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- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
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Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
context there have been several tipping of balances introduced by specific policies thought by social
economic and political actors Emblematic are European colonialism and the related cooperation by
local authorities as well as the fall of African socialist regimes following the adoption of Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the
pervasive internal corruption dramatic social inequalities and fragmented development The sources
of the catastrophes are visible as are the consequences What has been seen and largely shown is the
disintegration of the social fabric mirrored for instance by the increase in land disputes and land
conflicts within households neighbours or communities at large
Another clearly visible consequence is gender inequality fuelled and perpetrated by marginalisation
and resulting in discrimination against women First ldquothere are social and economic inequalities that
increasingly separate individualsrsquo abilities to access and buy land in the age of newly liberalised
African land marketsrdquo8 and women are emblematic in this sense Women face discrimination in terms
of rights land inheritance property and ownership because gender equality is neither legally
interiorised at the justice level nor socially at the cultural level Second their economic status often
depends on their social status whether they are still married or widows whether they have children or
not whether they can count on solid relational networks The role of women transcends individuality
as long as they are flanked by men be it a husband an eldest son a brother-in-law a father or the
clan elders Once they have lost the lsquosupportrsquo of these figures the woman is now only an individual
And it is here that her vulnerability emerges at her husbandrsquos death at her resistance against the
expropriation of rights and goods the woman can potentially lose everything A woman can be
ostracised from her community or lose her life In Tanzania behind of both prospects there is often an
accusation of witchcraft The following story will clarify the extent of this aspect
Ruth Zacharia is a Tanzanian widow who was accused of witchcraft and attacked in her house by
three people armed with machetes The reason for the attack was a land dispute In 2017 Reuters
reported her story through her own words
ldquoThey said lsquoWe have been sent by our mother because you killed our father so that you could buy that landrsquordquo the 63-year old recalled fidgeting with her stiff scarred right hand
ldquoI said lsquoI am not a witchrsquoThey started cutting me all overrdquo
[hellip]
Zachariarsquos troubles began after she bought an acre of land in 2011 near her home in Tanzaniarsquos western Magu District
Another family wanted the land but they were unable to pay for the entire two-acre plot after their father died So the vendor split it between the two families who knew each other through the local church
Zacharia planted rice on her portion but the other familyrsquos cows trampled it One night she woke to seeflames outside her window as petrol had been doused over the three overhanging her house Finally she was attacked9
8 Dancer 2015 p 52
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
In Tanzania this incident is not an exception and highlights the deep intertwining between land rights
and women discrimination It also points out that ldquothe killing of alleged witches might well be an
epiphenomenon of greed not just something propelled by belief in witchcraftrdquo10 The prosecution and
sentencing to death of women accused of practising witchcraft usually follow traumatic events at both
the family and social level A natural disaster a sudden epidemic an economic crisis a family dispute
are some of the conditions that lead to the use of physical and psychological violence against women
One explanation is that they ldquobecome easy targets for those who need a scapegoat to explain their
troublesrdquo11 Yet at the same time by accusing them of witchcraft women are prevented from enjoying
and claiming their rights in this case their rights to land
The expression in the title ndash ldquoWomen without a blanketrdquo ndash refers precisely to this vulnerable status of
women In some parts of Tanzania there is a tradition of passing a blanket shuka from father to son
which symbolises the responsibility for the family land12 Women are not entitled to own the blanket
which metaphorically and pragmatically represents security The concept of blanket refers to the body
of land rights both customary and statutory that are not fully recognised and guaranteed to women
Land grabbing by not acknowledging these right and the issues associated with them contributes to
the disintegration of the blanket
12 Objective and Research Questions
The United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) has argued that ldquoland
is not a mere commodity but an essential element for the realisation of many human rightsrdquo13
Land is a vital asset to individual and communities around the world When land is threatened due todiscriminatory practices conflict corruption unsustainable development forced evictions or land confiscations environmental degradation or other factors individuals and communities suffer This often manifests in civil political economic social and cultural rights violations and in distinctive impacts on women and men14
However as mentioned above and as will be analysed throughout the research land rights in Tanzania
are threatened by the current policies of land grabbing namely policies that enable and regulate large-
scale land investments and acquisitions This causes a further violation of human rights or haki sawa
the Kiswahili expression for lsquoequal rightsrsquo at the centre of important debates related to jurisprudence
and the rule of law In particular womenrsquos rights are frequently undermined
9 K Migiro ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
10 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 2011 S Mesaki ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and
BC Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Live Stockholm Nordiska Africainstitutet 2009 p 80
12 Dancer 2015 p 82 13 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standards and
Applications United Nations 2015 p 1 14 Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 19 April 2021)
3
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
The objective of my thesis is twofold to explore the effects of land grabbing on social and gender
relations and to provide a policy framework in response to these effects The research will be guided
by two bodies of questions from which other insights will hopefully emerge
1 (a) Is it possible to verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-
related incidents in Tanzania over the last decade (b) How does gender inequality play a role
in this correlation
2 Based on the answer to the previous question what has been done or what needs to be done in
terms of policies and activism to counteract rightsrsquo violations
13 Background and Relevance
Before providing the reader with the theoretical framework and the main theoretical tenets of this
research I will briefly outline the background on which the research topic is based In section 211 I
offer a definition of land grabbing and how this practice is extremely linked to womenrsquos rights and
gender discrimination On the other hand it is necessary to have an overall picture of why land
grabbing in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in many other regions of the Global South has become
such a hot topic debated in academia in the media in various governmental and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) in the field of international cooperation and development policies for rights-
centred agencies and associations The debates mainly revolve around one question can land grabbing
be an opportunity for development and economic growth or is it a risk for the lsquoinvestedrsquo communities
Since my main assumption is that land grabbing presents in the long and short term more
disadvantages than advantages for expropriated communities I will review of what in political
economy are called lsquonegative externalitiesrsquo International agencies and organisations - including World
Bank IMF and FAO - scientists engineers and various scholars have analysed the impacts of land
grabbing These impacts are manifold and often extremely interconnected They include issues of
sustainability particularly where massive land investments are intended for the cultivation of
monocultures or the production of biofuels (which renders Tanzania extremely attractive to foreign
investors) In both cases the consequence is what has been defined as lsquowater grabbingrsquo ldquoa
circumstance where powerful actors are able to appropriate water resources at the expenses of
traditional local users often with negative impacts on the environmentrdquo15 And since man lives in a
relationship of dependence on the environment what changes natural arrangements changes social
arrangements Water grabbing in particular affects women who ldquoare generally more responsible for
domestic water suppliesrdquo16 Often the transformation of irrigation system for the purpose of
increasing land productivity becomes dysfunctional for local households and communities Given the
increasing difficulty in accessing water and the almost entirely female responsibility for this domestic
task (in Tanzania women spend on average more time than men in collecting water 500 hours per
15 J DellrsquoAngelo P DrsquoOdorico and M C Rulli ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by land and water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 p 122
16 J Behrman R Meinzen-Dick and A Quisumbing The Gender Implications of Large-Scale Land Deals Discussion Paper of International Food Policy Research Institute 2011 p 12
4
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
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Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
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Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
year17) women suffer most from this situation Not forgetting that women are also ldquothe guardians of
household food securityrdquo18 responsible for the food preparation and collection Therefore either when
agricultural investments involve the exports of most or all crops and when the biofuels production
requires land once rich in different varieties of crops ldquothe situation can be detrimental to local food
securityrdquo and subsequently to womenrsquos marginalisation19
Marginalisation is a pertinent term to define the socio-economic impacts of land grabbing
Marginalisation is a form of social exclusion whereby certain groups of people are relegated to the
margins of society in the strict sense and of the decision-making processes that govern its dynamics it
is practised through the deprivation of economic political social legal and civil rights20 that increase
the distance between the so-called centre and the so-called margin It is an exclusion of perspectives
of those voices that should be heard in a truly egalitarian and integrated society In relation to land
grabbing marginalisation is both a starting point and an end point Firstly there tends to be a lack of
dialogue with local communities to understand their needs This has further repercussions especially
for those groups already most vulnerable whether men women or children With the loss of land
through the so-called Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLAs) indigenous people lose their source of
livelihood which usually leads to a search for other wealth sources most notably paid work However
gender biases entail the exclusion of women from wage labour opportunities or better working
conditions thus increasing their vulnerability21
This chain of events problems and solutions are not Tanzania-specific Land grabbing happens in East
Africa ndash the case of Madagascar is very well known ndash as well as in Latin America on Oceaniarsquos
islands22 and in the Indian sub-continent Likewise the impacts of these practices very often follow
the same pattern weaving a common thread between global areas This thread is often followed by
accusations of witchcraft especially against women and increasingly linked to land issues23 The
overall picture is one of expropriation of land and disenfranchisement which is actualised through
accusation and then conviction for witchcraft which can be isolation banishment from the community
or death The case of Tanzania caught my attention for several reasons Here land is a source of
sustenance for most people and at the same time a place of land grabbing beliefs in witchcraft are
alive and the discourse of haki sawa is just as heated Women are at the centre of my research to
highlight how land grabbing undermines their rights both by depriving them of their blanket and as a
reason to accuse them of witchcraft
17 Bherman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 12 18 Ibid p 15 19 Ibid 20 R Peace ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept In Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of New Zealand vol 16
2001 21 Behrman Meinzen-Dick and Quisumbing 2011 p 10 22 Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website] httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-
most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March 2021) 23 S Federici ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 p
115
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
2 Pathways to Research
In this chapter I will outline the theoretical and methodological paths undertaken to develop the
research problem I will outline the theories applicable to the research topic as well as those that I
consider as starting points for my analysis
21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
The importance of policy as a subject of anthropological analysis arises from the fact that policies are major instruments through which governments companies non-governmental organisations (NGOs) public agencies and international bodies classify and regulate the spaces and subjects they seek to govern Policy is a fundamental lsquoorganising principlersquo of society which like lsquofamilyrsquo lsquonationrsquo lsquoclassrsquo or lsquocitizenshiprsquo provides a way of conceptualising and symbolising social relations and around which people live their lives and structure their realities24
In their introduction to Policy Worlds (2011) Chris Shore and Susan Wright suggest an anthropological
approach that does not look at policies as results of linear and rational processes but as ldquoproductive
performative and continually contestedrdquo25 Policies are capable of changing social agentsrsquo interactions
by modifying the environments where these occur By raising demands and needs everyone
contributes to policy formation from policy makers to civil society Neo-liberal and land policies
which are intertwined in this context include those adopted on the advice ndash or pressure ndash of World
Bank and IMF26 Therefore policies that may have been adopted voluntarily or under external
influence Shore and Wright define this approach lsquopolicy transferrsquo27 Privatisation and commodification
of communal land with the consequent plan to attract foreign and internal profitable investments is a
neoliberal policy both recommended by international actors and perceived by the Tanzanian
government as a pathway to development and growth But land grabbing policies have increased
gender discrimination and inequality thus creating a problem that policies should recognise identify
and resolve According to Shore and Wright this lsquopractitioner perspectiversquo is inefficient preferring an
interpretative approach which asks ldquo lsquoHow do people engage with policy and what to they make of
itrsquordquo28 I rephrase this question to ask what land grabbing policies have done to the sphere of womenrsquos
rights especially when implemented alongside other gendered discriminatory policies The basic idea
is precisely that policies are not immovable but discursive as ldquonarrative[s] in a continual process of
translation and contestation [hellip] rsquopolicyrsquo is a political process involving many actors all proposing how
people should relate to each other conduct themselves and be governedrdquo29 But if these policies prove
to be the source of other dysfunctions than the process should start again
24 C Shore and S Wright ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power New York-Oxford Berghahn Books 2011 p 3
25 Ibid p 1 26 Ibid p 7 27 Ibid 28 Ibid p 8 29 Ibid p 14
6
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
Tanzania is my ethnographic sensibility echoing Shore and Wright and witchcraft accusations in
relation to land grabbing is my ldquosmall sit[e] that opens windows onto larger processes of political
transformationrdquo30 Namely the process that will lead to the guarantee land rights to women
211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
Since its definition in the Tirana Declaration result from the Global Assembly of the International
Land Coalition (ILC) in 2011 the expression lsquoland grabbingrsquo has been extensively used to indicate
investments of large farmland31 FAO reports analyses elaborated by Katelyn Baker-Smith and Szocs
Boruss Miklos Attila published by Eco Ruralis a Romanian peasant organization which shows how
the expropriation of land coincides with the expropriation of rights Despite the complexity of the
concept the two authors ldquodeveloped a definitional framework that can be used for any geographical
area It is based on five criteria size people control legality and usagerdquo32
Land grabbing can be defined as being the control (whether through ownership lease concession contracts quotas or general concession contracts quotas or general power) of larger than locally-typical amounts of land by any person or entity (public or private foreign or domestic) via any means (lsquolegalrsquo or lsquoillegalrsquo) for purposes of speculation extraction resource control or commodification at the expense of peasant farmers agroecology land stewardship food sovereignty and human rights33
Generally land grabs are considered as LSLAs which consist in ldquomore than 200 hectares (ha) and are
affected by a change of userdquo34 This practice has become extremely common throughout the Global
South including Sub-Saharan Africa which is considered abundant in natural resources and land
Saturnino M Borras Jr Ruth Hall Ian Scoones Ben White and Wendy Wolford have contributed to
the research of Peasant Studies by suggesting a new approach to land grabbing analysis they urge a
dialogue ldquowith social movements activists policy makers and concerned academics to produce data
and debate potential implicationsrdquo35 Considering the global scope of the phenomenon the authors
want to verify the effects in a cross-cutting way and for this they formulate a very long series of
questions Of the latter one was central to the development of my research proposal ldquoWhat are the
issues that unite or divide the rural poor organized movements and rural communities around the
issue of land dealsrdquo36 In other words what are the effects on the community and individual levels
In recent times several research have been carried out to measure quantitatively and qualitatively the
impacts of land loss by rural populations Given two main factors the attractiveness of Sub-Saharan
Africa to land investors and the presence of more than half of the total population living in rural
30 Shore and Wright 2011 p 12 31 International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times of intensified natural
resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana AL International Land Coalition 2011
32 K Baker-Smith and S Attila What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existing definitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016 p 2
33 Ibid p 234 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016 p 1 35 S Borras et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorial introductionrdquo The Journal of
Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 p 211 36 Ibid p 212
7
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
Bibliography
Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
areas37 this region has been the focus of analysis in terms of opportunities and risks As Lorenzo
Cotula Sonja Vermeulen Rebeca Leonard and James Keeley argue in Sub-Saharan Africa including
Tanzania among countries with more LSLAs the issue of land grabbing takes on a different character
than in the rest of the Global South plagued by the same phenomenon These scholars emphasised the
role of property rights systems in Africa38 how their nature influence the extent of land deals and
acquisitions Rural communities small landowners and families face a loss of access to natural and
vital resources perpetrated by the abuse and the violation of their land rights which are often not
considered legally binding due to their customary nature
Along these lines a conflict between tradition and modernity emerges The modern is represented by
the companies investing in the country promising development and economic benefits Tradition on
the other hand is the set of customary ldquosystems and practices recognised by a particular community
as having normative significancerdquo as intended in the policy literature39 In the context of land grabbing
and land rights both lsquomodernityrsquo and lsquotraditionrsquo hinder women of fully enjoying their rights Helen
Dancerrsquos field study in Arusha region highlights how either the statutory law ndash lsquomodernrsquondash and the
customary law - lsquotraditionrsquo - hinder gender equality and equal rights As she reports ldquoone
contemporary definition of customary law is lsquoa normative order observed by a population having been
formed by regular social behaviour and the development of an accompanying sense of obligationrdquo40
Dancer argues that ldquoTanzaniarsquos codified customary laws and their gender discriminatory aspects [hellip]
remain in force and applicable in many patrilineal areas of Tanzania where districts have adopted
them as local lawrdquo41 One example is that of the blanketrsquos inheritance the land inheritance which
usually exclude female offspring Dancerrsquos theoretical contribution is to show that gender equality will
be effective when paralleled by challenges against systems of male-centric power relations and through
coordinated policyrsquos and customary lawsrsquo reforms To agree with Dancer there are Elizabeth Daley
and Birgit Englert who argue that ldquogiven the number and complexity of processes of change
impacting on womenrsquos land rights the arena of land tenure reform policy formulation and
implementation offers the most direct scope for effective action to secure womenrsquos land rightsrdquo42 And
a key to effective change is also to avoid total scepticism about customary laws that is to deny what
Daley and Englert call ldquoreceived wisdomrdquo which means considering all customary laws and
institutions as bad They suggest ldquoWhere existing customary institutions can be used as a vehicle for
[supporting and promoting womenrsquos land rights] why not use themrdquo43 In other words customarily
women can access land through their marriage hence through their husband Why then not maintain
37 World Bank Rural population ( of total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website] httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021) 38 Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and international land deals in
Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009 39 Dancer 2015 p 16 40 G R Woodman ldquoA Survey of Customary Laws in Africa in Search of Lessons for the Futurerdquo New York
Cambridge University Press 2011 p 10 cited in Dancer 2015 p 17 41 Dancer 2015 p 18 42 E Daley and B Englert ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol 4 no 1 2010
p 93 43 Ibid p 99
8
such access to land making it a right irrespective of a womanrsquos marital status Dancer for instance
suggests that ldquoengaging local communities in reforming their own customary laws using constitutional
principles can help to promote womenrsquos land rights at a social levelrdquo44
212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
In my thesis witchcraft will be conceived as an expression and mode of marginalisation and
discrimination against women A general increase in witchcraft accusations in times of uncertainty has
been widely discussed Edward Miguel argued that in some parts of Tanzania accusations of
witchcraft reach a peak when there are heavy rainfalls that adversely affect the harvest therefore
resulting in income shocks45 Whether the alleged witch is blamed for manipulating nature or is
condemned because she is old and therefore a burden on the suffering society witchcraft remains a
key to understanding and dealing with reality ldquoThe term lsquowitchcraftrsquo has been generally used to cover
a variety of activities often the nefarious sortrdquo46 the harmful ones So Henrietta Moore and Todd
Sanders have tried to simplify as best they could a phenomenon that takes multiple forms in Africa
Witchcraft takes on distinctive characteristics even in Tanzania alone and depending on the ethnic
group But in the search for continuity between belief systems what has emerged is the appeal to
witchcraft and occult forces to explain sudden misfortune natural disasters and apparently
inexplicable catastrophes With the world in constant flux however witchcraft too undergoes change
adapting to the reality it has to explain In this sense uncertainty can be a perennial state because
reality is constantly changing Yet there are times when the uncertainty of the present and especially
of the future is felt more strongly Land grabbing as a process of expropriation of land - and
conceiving land not only as a resource of livelihood but also as a symbol of spiritual cultural and
social bonding between people families and communities - can be seen as a source of uncertainty
Silvia Federici has analysed for a long time the link between anti-witchcraft movements in Africa and
the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies She reviews the so-called lsquowitch-huntrsquo that in
the last four decades has returned to claim victims in various regions worldwide According to
Federici
the current persecution of lsquowitchesrsquo is rooted in the intense social crisis that economic liberalization has produced in much of the world to the extent that it has stripped entire populations of their means of subsistence torn communities apart deepened economic inequalities and forced people to compete for diminishing resources47
44 Dancer 2015 p 18 45 E Miguel ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 46 H L Moore and T Sanders ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in H Moore and T
Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 p 3
47 Federici 2010 p 119
In this sense when people struggle ldquoto identify the forces governing their livesrdquo48 an answer might be
witchcraft Anthropological theories on witchcraft in Tanzania have shown that accusations are
generally linked to envy jealousy and wealth In societies where socio-economic inequalities are either
continuously growing or stagnating the feeling of uncertainty can be very common Federici provides
an eventual scenario characterised by ldquoa climate of mutual suspicion in which those who benefit from
economic liberalization fear being bewitched by those impoverished while the poor see the wealth
from which they are excluded as a product of evil artsrdquo49 Haram and Yamba define what lsquouncertaintyrsquo
means in anthropology by arguing that ldquois often used undefined to imply unpredictable outcomes
often of a negative kind that make life precariousrdquo50 Their work offers a cross-sectional view of the
strategies implemented by different ethnic groups in East Africa in times of uncertainty many of
whom resort to witchcraft as an explanation of misfortune Haram and Yamba clearly state that
The important issue then is how people make sense of everyday afflictions which compound uncertainty and mar their existence since how they perceive and understand such phenomena also shapes their responses These issues become crystallised when we see them as underlying any human attempt to manage and deal with the ontological insecurities of modern life51
Once again land grabbing fits perfectly as an insecurity of modern life as it threatens the economic
social and cultural lives of entire communities for instance by fostering conflicts over land However
the issue of women cannot be overlooked as much research shows that women suffer the greatest
impacts from both land grabbing and witch-hunts Federici speaks of a lsquowar on womenrsquo whose
triggers are not only rooted in misogynistic and patriarchal systems but find their raison for existence
in the neo-liberal economic system This gendered war is believed to ldquodiscipline all women thereby
preventing them from asserting their rightsrdquo52 Moreover ldquoas international agencies with the African
governments press for the privatization and alienation of communal lands witchcraft accusations
become a powerful means to break the resistance of those to be expropriatedrdquo53 One focus of my
thesis will also be on whether this conceptualisation can be applied to the specific case of Tanzania
22 Methodology and Source Materials
The present work will be essentially divided into two parts each of which will aim to answer the two
research questions The research methods used will be different for the respective two parts according
to thematic requirements The third chapter will be a cross-analysis on witchcraft-related incidents and
land deals in Tanzania As I have pointed out above several scholars have elaborated theories that link
an increase of witch-hunts and killings in the Global South with the so-called lsquo land rushrsquo result of
neo-liberal policies that make land a valuable asset on the global market Tanzania has also been
affected by this phenomenon attracting the attention of human rights organisations and agencies as48 Federici 2010 p 18 49 S Federici ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal of International
Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 p 25 50 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 13 51 Ibid p 16 52 Ibid p 22 53 Federici 2008 p 24
10
well as scholars and journalists The Legal Human Rights Centre - the Tanzanianrsquos human rights
advocacy organization established in 199554 - since early 2000s publishes an annual report on the
human rights situation in Tanzania Of the many areas covered by its human rights-related activism
and measurement work the centre collects all available data concerning witchcraft-related incidents I
will use these quantitative data to analyse the incidence of witchcraft killings from 2012 to 2020 the
year of publication of the most up-to-date report With regard to data on land deals I will use the
public database Land Matrix ldquoan independent land monitoring initiative that promotes transparency
and accountability in decisions over LSLAs in low- and middle-income countries by capturing and
sharing data about these deals at global regional and national levelrdquo55
A cross-analysis of data will be performed on a geographical basis namely by checking whether there
is consistency between reported witchcraft-related incidents and the location of lands under contract
With this research method I attempt to understand whether the alleged dependency relationship
between land grabbing and accusations of witchcraft is immediately visible In this I will provide
maps and graphs that I have drawn up with the available data in order to accompany myself and the
reader throughout my arguments The maps were processed with the geographical software QGIS and
the graphs with the Excel calculation programme
With the awareness that each Tanzanian ethnic group has its own beliefs about witchcraft I will also
refer to more specifically anthropological aspect within the quantitative analysis Land disputes are one
of the factors that drive such communities to witchcraft accusations in a context of pervasive sense of
uncertainty Therefore analysing the reasons why witches are blamed for wanting to unfairly
appropriate land for example is essential to understand the link between witchcraft intra-community
land disputes and the larger spectre of land grabbing with an eye to gender discrimination Here in
the absence of an immediate possibility to carry out field work ethnographic research conducted by
other scholars will be my main source of materials
Chapter four is designed to answer to the second research question and will consist of a critical review
of initiatives implemented or recommended to counter both land grabbing witchcraft violence and
women discrimination I will refer to various forms of activism from civil society and human rights
agencies and policy-reform proposals The sources will mainly be humanitarian reports amendments
and recommendations to change or abolish existing acts which are also essential sources (such as the
National Land Policy the Land Acts and the Witchcraft Act) Secondary sources will be articles from
local newspaper which discuss the phenomenon of witchcraft and outline its impacts on Tanzanian
society On the other hand important in my thesis will always be the focus on the globality of these
dynamics and for this I will also use online articles by foreign newspapers to understand the attention
given to them internationally
54 Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction (accessed 01 March 2021)
55 Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
11
The use of two different methodologies responds to the need to approach the topics discussed from
different perspectives and above all to check whether the correlations theorised by the various
authors between land expropriation and witchcraft-related violence can actually be understood with
the data at our disposal Important note is the limited information on witchcraft cases which although
reported by local newspapers and humanitarian organisations may offer an inaccurate picture of the
entire phenomenon Since these are often criminal actions they may not be fully reported Anyhow
the cases reported and their monitoring by the LHRC will at least allow us to understand the trend of
violence over the years and where it does happen more often
23 State of Research
Govind Kelkar and Dev Nathan are two Indian authors who studied witch-hunts in different times and
geographies to trace those common dynamics that have led worldwide to persecute witches They
explain witch-hunts through three variables ldquoa culture of witchcraft beliefs gender struggles to the
creation and re-creation of patriarchy and structural or major socio-economic transformations
including the formation of private property and of the capitalist market economyrdquo56 Their approach to
understand witchcraft accusations and persecutions is multi-causal57 as Federici argues it is not
enough to look only at social institutions firmly anchored in misogyny or patriarchy Kelkar and
Nathan ldquoemphasise the role of socio-economic transformations rather than static structures in witch-
huntsrdquo58 In many ways the two authors recall the analysis by Federici already presented as one of my
main theoretical tenets Witchcraft is a ever-changing cultural phenomenon its appeal fluctuates
according to changes in social institutions The loss of a state of harmony leads to a source of distress
into which latent or already manifest behaviours such as misogynistic violence are poured Therefore
jealousy and envy ndash those feelings generally pinned on the witch who acts to harm others ndash can no
longer explain witchcraft accusations alone
On the 5th March 2021 Alessandro Barbero Italian historian spoke at an online meeting on magical
thinking Dante and contemporaneity Title of the meeting was ldquoOgni epoca ha le sue streghe anche
la nostrardquo59 (ldquoEvery age has its witches also oursrdquo) Humanitarian and police reports as well as
ethnographic works and civil society protests in many Regions of the world tell us exactly this story
witches are real Sanders Maia Green Simeon Mesaki Knut Christian Myhre have extensively
studied witchcraft among various ethnic groups in Tanzania their beliefs how alleged witches are
treated in times of uncertainty From many of these works emerges how women are more likely to be
accused of witchcraft Green and Sanders have in turn argued that in Tanzania SAPs and other
main structural economic transformations have changed the incidence of anti-witchcraft movements
And what about the movements for the protection of the persecuted
56 G Kelkar and D Nathan Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural Transformation Cambridge Cambridge University Press 2020 p 191
57 Ibid p 190 58 Ibid p 9 59 Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M Ciardi Torino Italia
Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed 2 April 2021) 12
Federici laments the absence of feminist solidarity combining scholarship and political mobilisation
an activism on several fronts that aim at ending this lsquowar on womenrsquo She claims that
for witch-hunts to become a key issue in the international feminist and social justice movements a broad research project is needed providing a lsquomore systematic more specificrsquo analysis of the connectionbetween lsquoglobal economic restructuring and the outbreak of witch-hunts and murderrdquo60
Land grabbing is part of this global economic restructuring as it changes the social institutions of
entire communities
Causal relations between land grabbing and gender inequality have been largely discussed and
analysed Julia Berhman Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Agnes Quisumbing offer a critical overview of all
those situations where women are marginalised and discriminated due to LSLAs These situations are
closely linked to access to land water and other essential resources including income sources
However their conclusion is to rethink the land deals in such a way to avoid further gender
inequalities
This recommendation should be taken with caution For instance the Tanzanian government acted in
this sense but ineffectively Emblematic here it has been the increase of witchcraft incidents which
touches the sphere of human rights from multiple angles Therefore rather than rethinking the nature
of land contracts it is important to understand the reaction of events that they trigger in different
social contexts Among these reactions the community strategies implemented including both
accusations and condemnations of witchcraft and the public responses to them Tanzania has already
proved to be a laboratory in both senses but it is extremely relevant to see how various groups in
society react to injustice This is why the role of citizens of people must be included in the analysis
of both decision-making processes and the effects of policies Understanding the effects of land
grabbing must also include the reactions of communities whether they result in witchcraft-related
violence or protests and resistance or in activism aimed at reforming the policies themselves Taking
into consideration the phenomenon of witchcraft to explain the gendered effects of land grabbing in
Tanzania will serve precisely to this purpose to promote a methodology that is mindful of people and
their agency The methodology I want to suggest is one that is multi- and inter-disciplinary thus
combining different approaches and theories and broadening the perspective of analysis
60 Federici 2010 p 26 13
3 The Land of Witches
In this chapter I will answer to the first body of research questions First I will outline the land
grabbing situation in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 through an overview of international and national
policies that have progressively led to land gabbing practices in the country and through a quantitative
and qualitative analysis of the data provided by the Land Matrix database The latter include all the
transnational and domestic land deals for which negotiations have started since 2012 a watershed year
in terms of land policy reform and the year from which the annual ldquoTanzania Human Rights Reportsrdquo
are available LHRC reports offer relevant and enlightening information not only on the situation of
witchcraft-related incidents but also on the situation of land conflicts in the country The latter can be
a litmus test of the disintegration of the social fabric and thus of how communities address the sense
of uncertainty And at the same time they can shed light on gender relations and the role of women
To complete the arguments the situation of witchcraft-related violence in the country will be put
under scrutiny to understand whether it is part of the gendered effects of land grabbing or a dynamic
that has roots elsewhere In this sense I will also consider some ethnic groups in relation to witchcraft
beliefs Can we really talk about the lsquoland of witchesrsquo
31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
In Tanzania in 2012 ldquosix deals were concluded covering 38 632 hectaresrdquo61 and although they do not
comprehend the largest size under contract the government decided from the following year to
ldquo[restrict] the size of land that single large-scale foreign and local investors can lsquoleasersquo for agricultural
userdquo62 In fact of these six deals there are four transnational and one domestic with the intention of
investment in food crops all lease in nature This type of contract causes various impacts on
Tanzanian local communities who cannot access the land managed by outside investors ldquofor 50 or
even 99 yearsrdquo which could become unsustainable for several reasons by compelling local
populations to look for other sources of livelihood that are not always easily available it could lead to
intensive exploitation of the land and its eventual degradation making it inaccessible for future
generations However this course of events was the result of a series of policies implemented by the
Tanzanian government since 1985-86 Before this time land grabbing practices took more the form of
nationalisation of private properties many of whom ldquowere allocated to parastatal organs such as the
National Agriculture and Food Corporation (NAFCO) or National Ranching Corporation (NARCO)
among many others established for particular crops or products (eg coffee cotton sisal cashews
etc)rdquo63 Alleged socialist policies also led in the 1970s to ldquothe voluntary or forced relocation of up to
five million rural citizenswithout reference to existing customary rights to land as recognised by
existing statuterdquo64 61 Land Matrix Large Scale and Acquisitions Profile Tanzania 2016 p 4 62 O Kiishweko ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021) 63 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 3-464 Ibid p 4
14
During the Ujamaa in Tanzania the issue of land ownership and land rights had already triggered
mixed feelings among the population especially the rural population whose livelihoods depended on
working the land Moreover land grabbing practices were already in place albeit to different degrees
and in different ways before the advent of the SAPs recommended by the IMF In short the
objectives of these structural reforms were to correct and eliminate the distortions and dysfunctions
that hindered the development of emerging economies In official reports the dichotomy balance-
imbalance is often used to indicate how the implementation of these reforms was intended to bring
about a balance between international political economies65 As the final outcome of negotiations with
the IMF SAPs consisted of conditional loans provided by the World Bank that in the long term were
supposed to foster resilience economic growth and stabilisation in recipient countries many of which
were in Sub-Saharan Africa66 With a serious socio-economic crisis underway ndash which in turn led to
the end of the socialist regime - Tanzania has embarked on the path of reform mapped out by the
international institutions thus implementing trade liberalisation ndash both in goods and services and in
foreign investments - and ldquoprivatisation of parastatal entitiesrdquo67 This eventually led to the
privatisation of land allocated to these entities during Nyererersquos government
Generally speaking economic liberalisation increased the desire and ability of members of the political elite to enrich themselves The early profits were made in import-export trade in which coastal peoples and Zanzibaris with links to India and the Middle East together with Tanzanian Asians were well represented Other lucrative areas were to be found in land grabbing urban real estate and the exploitation of tax loopholes Divestiture of parastatals also introduced a spoils character into Tanzanian politics as politicians positioned themselves to receive kickbacks or to become part-owner of the newly privatised companies68
The idea that the land and especially the village should be respectively a productive resource and a
ldquoefficient unit for fulfilling the requirements of a population across a huge and widely inaccessible
countryrdquo was already at the centre of the Ujamaa policy69 However within the opening up to
transnational and domestic investments land was no longer a common good to which one had a free
right In fact ldquoseveral changes worked in concert to encourage large-scale alienation of local
communitiesrsquo and smallholdersrsquo landsrdquo70 from the late 1980s to early 1990s when ldquonumerous land
tenure conflicts in pastoralist areas of northern Tanzaniardquo have been registered71
In this climate the concepts of economic growth and productivity generally were and still are
inseparable which is why strategies put in place to increase the former automatically aim to increase
the latter In either case in the long run intensive land use leads to other problems such as
sustainability Within a few years Tanzanian governance has changed route seeking to respond
65 S Lall ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 66 F Tarp Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic framework for analysing the crisis in sub-
Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge 2001 67 P Wobst Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis
Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute 2001 p 14 68 T Kelsall ldquoShow Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation of Tanzaniardquo The
Journal of Modern Africa Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 p 610 69 Wobst 2001 p 9 70 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 pp 4-5 71 Ibid p 5
15
through new policies to needs that are less related to the short term ndash such as the economic growth
that was desired as a matter of urgency ndash and more related to the long term ndash such as the need to
ensure sustainable development for future generation In 1995 the Tanzanian parliament approved the
National Land Policy (NLP) which ldquodeclares that all land in Tanzania is public land vested in the
President as trustee on behalf of all citizensrdquo72 Echoing Shore and Wright this event is symbolic of
ldquothe evolution of civil society and popular (re)engagement in government in policy making
processesrdquo73 in this case represented by the National Land Forum which presented the citizensrsquo
requests and grievances subsequently followed by political responses74 In the 1997 edition of the
NLP the objectives presented are summarised in ldquothe overall aim [hellip] to promote and ensure a secure
land tenure system to encourage the optimal use of land resources and to facilitate broad-based social
and economic development without upsetting or endangering the ecological balance of
environmentrdquo75 The policy text sketches the issue from several perspectives noting the various levels
of governmental authority (eg the Village Assemblies and Councils) as well as the different forms of
customary rights The issue of womenrsquos rights is also taken into account which I will return to later
With its regulatory mechanisms the NLP raised expectations of more democratic and equal land
tenure especially by delegating decision-making powers to the Village bodies regarding so-called
lsquoVillage Landsrsquo regulated by the Village Land Act (1999)76
After initial glimmers of optimism a series of changes in the global economy have again affected
Tanzania limiting what was hoped for with the NLP First the country began to set aside large areas
for biofuels production particularly jatropha77 ldquobecoming one of the foremost sources of large-scale
land acquisitionsrdquo from 2005 to 200878 NLP objectives had been overshadowed by the demands of
the global market which Tanzania was willing to accept in order to move forward with their economic
growth path What was intended to be avoided a decade earlier returned to threaten sustainability on
all fronts environment protection land exploitation due to the invasive conversion of production and
the consequent poor consideration for the vital social and economic needs of local communities
These concerns were subsequently exacerbated by the land rush related to the food price crisis
starting in 2007-0879 Tanzania could provide arable and cultivable large-scale land for export which
is why at the end of 2012 the government decided to regulate again LSLAs within the country What
was reported was a preference for large investments over the satisfaction of internal needs The latter
were linked to food security and development needs promised by various investors but then generally
not realised Political dysfunctions were also denounced in fact according to the Land Act of 1999
the occupation of land by non-citizens is restricted and requires as a precondition ldquoa right of
72 Wobst 2001 p 24 73 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 6 74 Ibid 75 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 276 Ibid s 4 77 Jatropha Curcas Linn (Jatropha) is a plant whose seeds contain a oil used to produce bio-diesel 78 Nelson Sulle and Lekaita 2012 p 9 79 Cotula et al 2009 p 4
16
occupancy or derivative right for purposes of investment prescribed under the Tanzanian Investment
Act Cap 38rdquo80 But other contradictions emerge here as well The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC)
regulated by the Tanzanian Investment Act is a government agency responsible not only for managing
but also for attracting investments in the country81 When a similar entity is delegated the legal
responsibility of whether to grant a foreign investor the right to occupy land conflicts of interest may
arise The debate at the end of 2012 had arisen to change the rules of the game and place further
limits on the LSLAs such as a cap on the size of land under contract depending on the type of crops
produced82 The focus has been on small-scale farmers who were considered the major responsible
for food security in the country ndash precisely because their activities were not for export but for
domestic demands However it is important to understand if and how the situation in Tanzania has
changed since this first reform to curb intrusive land grabbing ldquoCurbingrdquo is a key word because it does
not imply actions to stop the practice of alienating land from local communities and exploiting natural
resources but rather the will to slow it down without stopping it despite the negative impacts that
eventually emerge
311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
The Land Matrix database offers a wide range of information on land deals worldwide The basic
information is location investment intention negotiation and implementation status the size under
contract the operating company and whether they are transnational or domestic land deals Other
useful details are recorded for each deal to create a more or less comprehensive picture of their spatial
and economic as well as the social scope In fact in relation to my research topic information ndash when
available ndash about the presence or absence of land conflicts was extremely significant These depend on
the lack of dialogue that investor especially a foreign one has established with the local communities
and indigenous people and on how they reacted to the very prospect of investment on their land
Figure 1 shows the trend of land deals both transnational and domestic whose negotiations began ndash
and coincidentally also ended ndash from 2012 to 202083 In fact of the 23 deals under analysis none are
still being negotiated or have failed The number of domestic deals (ie those in which the investor is
a public or private company with its registered office in Tanzania) is lower (7) than that of
transnational deals (16) This reinforces the idea that Tanzania has been attractive for foreign land
investment and acquisition in recent years However the size of land under contract varies quite a bit
between transnational and domestic as depicted by the Figure 2 below
80 The Land Act 1999 (TZ) s 20 (1) 81 The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed
10 April 2021) 82 O Kiishweko ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012
httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021) 83 Note in my chart there are only three deals concluded in 2012 instead of the six mentioned above and reported by
Land Matrix in its report of 2016 on the LSLAsrsquo situation in Tanzania The reason for this is that I have deliberately selected those deals with the year of initiation between 2012 and 2020 This indicates that negotiations of the three deals not considered here began before 2012
17
Although there are significantly more transnational deals they cover around 8000 hectares less than
the domestic deals Moreover of the total hectares domestic investors allocated more land specifically
to food crops and livestock than foreign investors The latter on the other hand have invested more in
the mining and biofuel sectors On the other hand there are many deals that do not foresee a single
investment intention but several and often these are also the ones with the largest size of land under
contract Emblematic here is a deal on behalf of an Indian company whose activities range from food
to energy production In 2012 it concluded a lease agreement of 12132 hectares in Pwani Region
declaring as investment intentions biofuels food crops and renewable energy84 It is the largest land
size negotiated by a transnational investor from 2012 until 2020
84 Land Matrix Deal 3886 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886general (accessed 01 March 2021)
18
Figure 2 Land size under contract negotiated from 2012 to 2020
Figure 1 Land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
However among the deals I have selected the largest in terms of hectares is a domestic one in the
negotiations of which the TIC and other governmental and state actors were involved In 2015 Kigoma
Sugar Company has indeed invested on 39981 hectares for unspecified agriculture production but
the project is still in startup phase85 To be verified therefore is compliance with the size ceiling that
the government sanctioned in 2012 From the data presented it appears that these limits apply more
to foreign investments although there is no exact knowledge of the impacts that domestic land
grabbing may have on communities alienated from land
To complete this brief overview the chart below (Figure 3) shows how many of these projects are
actually operational This is pertinent since once land has been leased or outright purchased or
negotiated for a exploitation concession (this is specific to mineral resources) there is no clear
information whether local communities have the possibility to access it automatically or they have to
wait for the contract to be formally cancelled or expired Therefore the impacts that these deals have
on local communities can vary not only in the terms of land size granted but also in the general
discontent resulting from permanent or temporary land disuse For instance the two contracts
mentioned above the largest in terms of size are not currently in operation the transnational one has
not started yet the domestic one is still in startup phase which means that production is suspended but
scheduled to start further on
Figure 3 shows that none of the 7 domestic projects have been abandoned and two of them have not
yet started While transnational projects show a higher rate of abandonment as well as suspension or
delays in their start-up Of the 7 domestic land deals 5 are operational and therefore there is actual
land use The eventual reaction of the local communities from whom the land has been taken could
derive from the implementation status of the deals concluded they might question the very reason for
the investment since the land is not always actually used
85 Land Matrix Deal 7796 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796general (accessed 01 March 2021)
19
Figure 3 Implementation status of land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
To summarise in order to fully understand the impact that land grabbing has on local communities
multiple variables need to be taken into account On the one hand the policy review presented above
gives us the legal framework elaborated and accepted by the Tanzanian government On the other
hand there are practical quibbles that distinguish one land deal from another and this leads to
different reactions from the affected communities (core topic of the next subsection) and eventually
the processing of different responses
312 Meeting Local Communities
The 2020 LHRC report states that
For many Tanzanians land is a source of livelihood and is central to economic rights People need land which is becoming a scarce resource in the country for different purposes including farming grazing business and residence More than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on agriculture hence the increased importance of land As the country makes progress in economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and development projects86
Data on land disputes and institutional declarations are reported to show how despite the desire to
curb it land grabbing has not stopped causing negative impacts on society ldquoLegal aid data indicates
that land disputes constituted most legal aid cases at 39 This is an indicator of land disputes being
an issue of public concern hence need to intensify efforts to prevent and address themrdquo87
Of the 16 transnational land deals under analysis only 4 submit information on the relationship
between investors and local communities In turn of these only 3 record the presence of land conflicts
while one represents a peculiar case Among the three in two cases local communities rejected the
investments altogether to counter the danger of alienation from their lands In one of the two cases
the investor did not consult the local community members but only the elders of the Lipokela village
(Ruvuma Region) although the government recognised the community traditional or customary
rights This led the community to ldquounanimously agreed that land was granted without their consentrdquo88
ldquoThey attempted to complain and raise concerns about the investmentrdquo but when government
authorities visited the site ldquothey were not allowed to speak out or ask questionsrdquo89 In addition people
were displaced commenting that ldquoseveral families do not cultivate any land due to a shortage of land
andor soil fertility issuesrdquo90 The same fate befell the Ludogelo community (Njombe Region) where
in 2005 forced evictions occurred91 In both cases the agreements provided for a number of
development benefits financial support in terms of infrastructure and services However the presence
of land conflicts obscures any positive impacts derived from promised benefits Especially if the
negative impacts consist in the total alienation from land
86 LHRC Human Rights Protection and the Threat posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2021 p 155
87 Ibid 88 Land Matrix Deal 4757 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021) 89 Ibid 90 Ibid 91 Land Matrix Deal 5293 Local communities indigenous people [website]
httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)20
The last case is emblematic in this sense despite the community was not consulted its members
consented to the investment The comment on the community reaction is ldquoLocal people did not
consider foreign investors as intruders and new colonists but welcomed them based on ndash at least partly
justified ndash expectations of getting employment or other benefits as compensation for their landrdquo92
However ldquomany of the promised compensations have not materialisedrdquo and the investor company
ldquodid not pay any compensation in cash but constructed different infrastructural buildings in each
villagerdquo93 Although these are a few examples of how LSLAs impact local communities they are
illustrative of the mechanisms put in place by foreign investors as well as the governmental and local
authorities that work with them Equally significant is the fact that of these four cases the first and the
last mentioned were abandoned (and in relation to the last one it was stated that the land would be
returned to local communities in 2013) while the other two are still in operation
On the other hand among the 7 domestic deals presumably not a single one caused land conflicts As
reported by Land Matrix in the updated cases the customary rights of affected local communities
have been recognised by the government However with the partial accuracy of data on single
agreement it is not possible to draw a coherent and complete picture of how local communities
actually react to domestic land grabbing These are deals involving a substantial change of ownership
and use of land to which are attached promised benefits in the name of development tied to economic
growth to the idea of technological and infrastructural modernity implemented to increase
productivity In fact notwithstanding that the NLP ldquopromotes an equitable distribution of and access
to land by all citizensrdquo as first of its specific objectives in the same chapter it is also declared that the
policy wants to ldquoensure that land is put to its most productive use to promote rapid social and
economic development of the countryrdquo94 This and the central role played by government agencies
such as the TIC are part of a framework in which the attractiveness of foreign and domestic
investments is justified by the urgent need for growth According to the data (Figure 1) since 2013
the number of transnational negotiations has decreased significantly The trend in domestic land deals
on the other hand seems to alternate each year Does this mean that the desired growth has been
achieved or has there been an awareness of the negative impacts that have followed
32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
The 2014 LHRC report indicates that ldquoland grabbing for investment purposesis another cause of
land conflicts in Tanzania Such conflicts are experienced in areas with natural resources such as
minerals wildlife and areas with fertile soil suitable for agricultural activitiesrdquo95 In the 2012 and 2013
reports no paragraphs were devoted to conflicts of this kind This is not to say that there were no
human rights violations in this regard but that monitoring was probably not carried out However
92 Land Matrix Deal 4717 Local communities indigenous people [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717local_communities (accessed 03 March 2021)
93 Land Matrix Deal 4717 94 National Land Policy 1997 (TZ) s 2 (24)95 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015 p 159
21
from 2014 until 2020 entire sections of the reports addressed this issue and from multiple
perspectives Almost every year the primary source of land disputes has been cited as tensions
between farmers and pastors often bursting into violent clashes In particular in 2014 and 2015 there
were numerous violations of human rights related to right to property housing and life itself LHRC
reports point to a tendency for the government itself to increase land conflicts within and between
communities the eviction of peoples and the demolition of their properties in declared hazardous
areas are accompanied by economic and lsquodevelopmentrsquo strategies whereby land is allocated to
investors domestic or foreign In both cases communities are alienated from their land which is ldquoa
vital asset not only as valuable for economic activity but also because it carries spiritual valuerdquo96 Also
between 2014 and 2015 several victims of land disputes were reported and these figures indicate the
absence of peaceful dialogue between the conflicting parties The latter are often villagers farmers
and pastors government offices and local authorities and investors Conflicts emerge because of a
clash of visions and needs over land use and related boundary definitions In 2016 LHRC reports that
ldquoof recent years due to increasing investments in agriculture pressure on land use has as well
increased resulting to conflicts extending between investors and village authorities and sometimes
farmers in the respective villagesrdquo97 To exacerbate this situation either LHRC and the Tanzanian
citizens denounce a widespread corruption among both national and local government authorities
Between 2017 and 2020 there were several cases where village members denounced the violation and
abuse of their land rights without receiving any compensation whatsoever Situations of this kind can
increase tensions within communities between farmers and pastors ndash who according to LHRC ldquoonce
lived together in harmony for many yearsrdquo98 - as well as between communities and investors and
between communities and Tanzanian authorities
The climate that is being created especially in times when land grabbing has become a common
practice and ldquoparticularly a threat for villagers who need land for farming and indigenous peoplerdquo99 is
one of pervasive discontent and grievances In 2020 ldquomore than 70 of Tanzanians are reliant on
agriculture hence the increased importance of landrdquo however ldquoas the country makes progress in
economic development land acquisition has increased to pave way for large-scale farming and
development projectsrdquo100 Land is insurance for many communities and for many reasons food
economic sentimental and spiritual And despite the policies enacted by the Tanzanian government to
slow down land grabbing and subsequently to more effectively reduce and manage land conflicts in the
country these continue to be major problems for the well-being and development of local
communities In particular the reforms introduced first in 2012 and then in 2016 (the latter to put a
cap on the duration of land lease contracts from 99 years to 33 years101) have not been effective in96 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanizibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017 p
99 97 Ibid p 99 98 LHRC 2015 p 158 99 LHRC Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018 p 90 100 LHRC 2021 p 155 101 S M Kizito ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December
2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-land-grabbing-analysis 22
slowing down land grabbing but apparently have not contributed to reducing land conflicts either Of
course that was not their ultimate objective but it makes us understand how changes in terms of
clauses and legal conditions for the stipulation of land deals are not the expected answers that
communities were waiting for after their reactions to land alienation The consequent gradual
disintegration of the social fabric has much deeper roots in the distrust of onersquos neighbour in the
government itself which support those who are already more advantaged the richest102 ndash be they the
minority in society or the foreign company that wants to invest in the country in the deep inequalities
that mark the whole country These are all factors that increase the sense of uncertainty which is
being fostered by policies of modernisation development and economic growth that involve a radical
change in land use and its benefactors What has this meant in terms of intra-community relations In
times of uncertainty what have been the reactions and strategies of communities to restore the
previous state of security As explained in the theoretical framework the use of witchcraft
accusations occurred in many parts of East Africa and was explained as an attempt to restore a
previous collective state of harmony and security disrupted by development as Haram and Yamba
argue In Tanzania the combination of development and economic growth has led to LSLAs policies
which as we have seen cause tensions within the affected communities The progressive loss of
certainty about land and a whole range of assurance that if offers to individuals and entire groups has
contributed to the common belief that ldquolife has become more precarious and more uncertainrdquo103
Therefore in Tanzania is the witch-hunt a strategy to get by with a landless life Or is it a way to
securing onersquos rights by depriving othersrsquo of theirs
321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
Beliefs in witchcraft are very much alive in Tanzania and in recent years there have been numerous
incidents crimes and human rights violations related to them For this reason LHRC takes the issue
of witchcraft at heart not so much as a cultural aspect but in terms of discrimination and inequalities
that threaten the rights of many Tanzanians especially the right to life as argued by the Centre The
graph below (Figure 4) shows the trend of the reported and verified witchcraft-related incidents from
2012 to 2020 There is a clear and drastic decline between 2013 and 2014 however the 2014 annual
report only shows those incidents that occurred between January and June Half-year data have also
been reported for the 2016 and 2018 reports
(accessed 25 March 2021) 102 LHRC 2015 p 157 103 Haram and Yamba 2009 p 17
23
For the LHRC witchcraft-related incidents include killings on charges of allegedly practising
witchcraft The figures show that the phenomenon was substantial in the two years between 2012 and
2013 with respectively 631 and 765 killings Therefore considering that 320 killings were reported
for the first semester of 2014 projections for the second semester assume very similar numbers to the
previous two years The first significant drop in cases occurred in 2015 with 425 total cases reported
Since then the figures have started to fall year after year with 112 cases recorded in 2020 The most
likely victims of these attacks are women especially elderly and poor In 2014 LHRC report we read
that ldquogender biasness of the problem [witchcraft] can be explained as a result of women
marginalisation in the societyrdquo104 Here the organisation is discussing why elderly and poor women
especially in rural areas are the most likely targets it is because of having red eyes - a symbol in many
culture of malignancy and evil ndash due to the many hours spent at home cooking with fire105 However
the marginalisation of women is found in many other spheres The LHRC itself claims that
Another reason of targeting women in witchcraft killings is associated with property ownership whereby old women with land or any other immovable property become vulnerable to attacks and killings by using witchcraft as an excuse to obtain their property The truth however is that the killers want to eliminate those women in order to take over their properties Unfortunately those who kill might be close relatives to the victims including their own sons106
This is linked to the issue of inheritance of properties which is regulated by customary law Women
have access to land and other properties through their husbands or fathers who however are the
holders of property rights and decisions in this regard Widowed and elderly women are perceived as
obstacles for others whether family members or community members to access valuable resources
such as land These dynamics occur mainly in the Lake Zone where tradition has it that once the
grandfather has died the land is passed from the widow to a grandchild107
104 LHRC 2015 p 36 105 Ibid 106 Ibid p 37 107 Ibid p 42
24
Figure 4 Reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
In situations where this transition creates tensions within the family first the accusation of witchcraft
against the widow and then her brutal death (usually brutally committed by a mob at night or when
the woman is alone) are carried out to rid the land of the possible threat that the woman may
represent The LHRC does not go into detail about these dynamics but we might ask if the women
have no right to inherit the land on which they lived with their husbands then why take such pains and
commission their deaths Did these women resist their marginalisation
Figure 5 depicts the trend by Regions of witchcraft-related incidents reported by LHRC from 2012 to
2020 Categorisation is based on the frequency of cases reported year by year Two regions around the
southern shore of Lake Victoria (Mwanza and Geita in darkest shade of red) are the ones where
witchcraft killings occurred almost every year in the period under analysis However the whole area
around the lake and the western Regions recorded the highest rates of witchcraft-related crimes Other
regions of the country especially the southern and central ones have seen an increase in attacks since
2016 Thus in parallel with a reduction in the incidence rate of these crimes there has been a
progressive spread of the phenomenon from the northern regions to the rest of the country Whether
this development can be linked to the recent land grabbing policies will be the focus of the conclusive
section Before this I will provide an anthropological framework summarising the different
approaches to witchcraft which vary from ethnic group to ethnic group In particular this type of
analysis will give us the necessary support to understand if how and why in Tanzania witchcraft
women marginalisation and land are intertwined
25
Figure 5 Regional mapping of reported witchcraft-related incidents from 2012 to 2020
322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
In this sub-section I will mainly refer to accounts of field studies conducted by several anthropologists
in Tanzania many of which fit into the discourse of contemporary uncertainty and strategies to face
it More than 100 different ethnic groups live in Tanzania but here I will focus on a few of them
selected on the basis of their demographic density and geographical location in the country The map
below (Figure 6) represents the geographical distribution of the ethnic groups I will consider Chagga
Ihanzu Sukuma and those groups living in the southern Regions of Ruvuma and Morogoro
Although they are in some respects very different there are commonalities between ethnic groups
regarding witchcraft beliefs First and foremost the witch allegedly uses occult and evil powers
because of jealousy envy and greedy This is for the Ihanzu ndash who live mainly in Singida region
coloured in purple on the map ndash who think the witch as envious of the wealth of others and obsessed
with grabbing it For this group in particular it is ldquocommon knowledge that no one gets rich by
accidentrdquo but ldquoaccumulation of any sort requires determined efforts and frequently demands the
exploitation of unseen powers of witchcraftrdquo108 Hence those who get extremely rich are more likely
to be accused of witchcraft At the same time however those who have become richer may be the
object of envy on the part of a supposed witch Witchesrsquo activities often consist in destroying ldquootherrsquos
peoplersquos wealth in order to amass it for themselvesrdquo109 The witch for the Ihanzu is therefore linked to
material well-being at the centre of a desire so compelling that jealousy and envy guide her or his
actions
108 T Sanders ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in LHaram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet2009 p 110
109 Ibid p 105 26
Figure 6 Tanzanian ethnic groups geographical distribution
This is not very different for the Chagga people ndash third largest ethnic group in Tanzania and mainly
settled in Kilimanjaro Region (green on the map) ndash who tend to accuse of witchcraft those who might
resent loosing access to resources or wealth In this case as argued by Sally Falk Moore witchcraft
accusations are a sort of defence or prevention mechanism designed to protect the accuser from
possible harming acts of witchcraft110 Here another recurring trait emerges namely that witchcraft is
frightening because what is evil in society is attributed to it In southern Tanzania ldquowitches are
associatedwith notions of selfishness and greed with excessive animalistic humanityrdquo111 Witchcraft
which is not innate but assumed is a source of suffering112 and for this reason needs to be managed
controlled and eventually suppressed
It must be borne in mind that witchcraft is closely linked to the social and economic environment in
which it is believed to operate The ethnic groups considered here live off agriculture and animal
husbandry thus living off the land which symbolises material wealth but not only The land unites
individuals families and communities at large and as such also holds the spiritual and ancestral
bonding value Concurrently land can be an object of contention between individuals families and
communities precisely because it is a symbol and means of wealth In this sense accusations of
witchcraft are frequently linked to land issues For the Ihanzu people of farmers ldquomany of those who
regularly obtain large harvests are rumoured to have dabbled in the diabolical to acquire their goods
implying that other villagers have been robbedrdquo113 Also for the Chagga who live mainly on
agriculture land and witchcraft are intertwined
Chagga communities provide for land inheritance to pass the eldest and youngest sons excluding other
children or family members from accessing the family land114 Moore argues that witchcraft
accusations are often presented by the hereditary legitimates in order to counteract the threat of
resentment from the other siblings and their families In fact among the Chagga ldquoaccording to
Moorersquos account witchcraft is locally considered an illicit means which the disadvantaged try to level
the differences between agnates that largely result from social changesrdquo115
Thus accusations of witchcraft tend to be aimed at resolving hereditary disputes to which the gender
issue is linked Like the Chagga the Sukuma are an agricultural and patrilineal society The largest
ethnic group in Tanzania Sukuma live mainly in the regions around Lake Victoria where the highest
rates of witchcraft-related incidents have been recorded The most likely victims are elderly people
especially women and widows Here witchcraft ldquomay be used as a tactic to attain certain ends for
example the resolution of misunderstanding quarrels and conflicts over matters such as land property
110 K C Myhre ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haram and CB Yamba (eds) Dealing With Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 121-122
111 M Green ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Antiwitchcraft Practices in Southern Tanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters With the Everyday Bloomington Indiana UniversityPress 2015 pp 337
112 Ibid p 325 113 Sanders 2009 p 106 114 Myhre 2009 p 121 115 Ibid p 122
27
or inheritancerdquo116 This explanation of the dynamics behind accusations must be put side by side with
the image of the witch that Sukuma portray usually woman the witch ldquois someone familiar poor
may be deformed may make other feel guilty and therefore incur the anger of such peoplerdquo117 These
features can easily remind of the elderly woman probably a widow who cannot support herself but
relies on her family which implies relying on the family land In this sense the accusation of
witchcraft would allow other younger family members to gain access to the land and benefit from it
lsquoJustifyingrsquo this turn of the events are both the array of customary laws supporting patrilinearity and
the social and moral significance of getting rid of the agent ldquoresponsible for almost any calamity or
misfortunesrdquo118
Anti-witchcraft movements and actions therefore respond to the collective demand for tranquillity to
remove what could destroy their harmony as well as their wealth And this is where a significant
difference between the ethnic groups emerges The Sukuma people appear to be the most violent
when it comes to exercising condemnation of an alleged witch As reported by LHRC but also by
Mesaki the accusation of witchcraft often leads to the death of the accused ndash so much so to speak of
a ldquoTanzaniarsquos silent holocaustrdquo119 or of the ldquoold women in the Sukuma countryside [as] lsquobecoming an
endangered speciesrsquordquo120 While the Chagga and Ihanzu do not report frequent incidents of witchcraft-
related violence ndash as is also shown by the data in Figure 5 - in southern Tanzania the anti-witchcraft
movements are as institutionalised as they are reluctant to use extreme forms of violence Here two
factors have influenced the way witchcraft is managed and controlled the alleged witch is such
because of access to specific medicinal substances social organisation in farming communities is
based on relationships that are as fragile as they are essential for living in solidarity and harmony
According to Green for these two reasons the suspicion or accusation of witchcraft ldquocould be
addressed through purification rituals rather than violent exclusionrdquo121
These rituals involve shaving off the head hair less frequently the body hair of suspected witches Consequently shaving was and is a widespread euphemism for witchcraft suppression practices The ritual of being ldquoshavedrdquo kunyolewa is not restricted to alleged witches Part of its mass appeal is that being shaved not only disempowers persons with witchcraft it protects other people from future supposed witchcraft attacks122
This might explain why in southern Tanzania there has not been an alarming rate of witchcraft-related
violence However the strength of Greenrsquos analysis is to recognise the political and economic
liberalisation of the country as a turning point Whereas political institutions used to cooperate with
each other to eradicate witchcraft seen as enemy of Tanzaniarsquos modernisation and development now
practices to suppress it (shaving) are ldquouseful services that helps individuals solve disputes about
116 Mesaki 2009 p 84 117 Ibid p 76 118 Mesaki 2009 p 77 119 F B Mfumbusa ldquoWitch Killings Tanzaniarsquos Silent Holocaustrdquo Africanews vol 27 no 7-8 1999 cited in
Mesaki 2009 p 72 120 Mesaki 2009 p 72 Here Mesaki refers to a statement by the Tanzania Media Women Association (TAMWA) 121 Green 2015 p 327 122 Ibid
28
witchcraft rather than as instrument in the national development endeavourrdquo123 It can be argued that
the accusation of witchcraft is the solution to individual issues still drawing strength from the idea
that witchcraft is a threat to the whole community However accusations and witchcraft itself change
connotations depending on the context As Sanders Mesaki and Moore agree social and structural
changes brought about by SAPs and economic liberalisation since colonialism have influenced the
spiritual dimension and how to approach it Knut Christian Myhre Chaggarsquos expert considers
witchcraft as a manifest mirror of the fragility of interpersonal relations which ldquocan always be
disruptedby someone who is spatially and relationally closerdquo124 Myhre does not agree with Moore
who argues that the integration of Chagga communities within the global trade conditioned by the
introduction of cash cropping has caused a whole series of uncertainties125 Commonly to the fate of
the Sukuma the land became scarce and this caused tensions within the households in matter of
inheritance and property A reaction to this situation is witchcraft accusation
In other words in order to understand witchcraft it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive approach
one must consider human feelings ndash such as jealousy resentment and envy ndash not alone but as
embedded in a social and economic system vulnerable to structural changes These latter in forms of
political and economic reforms as well as structural upheavals in daily life ndash for example the
conversion of land use and holders from primary source of life to mono-production destined to export
ndash can increase the ambiguity and uncertainty entrenched in social human and especially gender
relations
33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
In this section I will present my conclusions on the first research questions first through a geographical
snapshot of the phenomena of land grabbing in Tanzania from 2012 to 2020 and then by comparing
this with the already presented overview of witchcraft (Figure 5) The maps depict the regional
mapping of the land deals considered for the elaboration of the graphs shown above (Figure 1 Figure
2 and Figure 3)
331 Does less Land equals more Witches
As shown in Figure 7 the 7 domestic land deals negotiated and concluded between 2012 and 2020 in
Tanzania were mainly concentrated in the southern part of the country specifically in Morogoro and
Pwani Regions (southern centre and south-eastern coast) In Pwani 7469 hectares of land are in lease
for food crops and agriculture production within two different contracts 5506 of these hectares once
community land are now under lease for a duration of 99 years but the project has not started yet
Also in Morogoro the two lease deals concluded between 2014 and 2015 are for the cultivation of
123 M Green ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post-adjustment TanzaniardquoAnthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 2005 p 250 124 Myhre 2009 p 134 125 Ibid p 121
29
food crops However the size of the land in question is considerably smaller than that under contract
in Pwani here it is 530 and 30 hectares in current use
The other regions where there have been LSLAs are Kigoma ndash the only one in the north of the
country and already mentioned in the sub-section 311 ndash Tanga and Iringa The registered contracts
are all leases whose duration varies from 99 years to 15 years when specified ndash and this depends on
the year of negotiation due to the 2016 reform on the 33-year limit on lease ndash and whose investment
intention revolves around agriculture from growing food crops livestock farming or lsquoagriculture
unspecifiedrsquo Worthy of note is how much of the harvest is destined for export Of the 7 contracts 3
show lsquoexportrsquo on the production information one of which ndash the one covering 530 hectares in
Morogoro ndash allocates 20 per cent of production to the domestic market and 80 per cent to export
mainly to Kenya and United Arab Emirates126 Without specifying how much is actually exported
also with regard to the other contract registered in Morogoro the countries of export are these two127
Domestic actors ndash including government and its agencies ndash have invested heavily in this part of the
country sometimes even promising capacity-building projects aimed at local communities which
however can only have access to a small part of the production Furthermore most deals provide for
contract farming for which ldquothe farmer agrees to provide a given quantity and quality of product
within an agreed-upon timeframe and the investor agrees either to purchase the harvest at a set price
or to provide a fixed percentage of the harvest to the farmer as rentrdquo128 It is a compromise which is
126 Land Matrix Deal 4507 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
127 Land Matrix Deal 4925 Produce info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925produce_info (accessed 03 March 2021)
128 Behrman et al 2011 p 11 30
Figure 7 Regional mapping of reported domestic land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
intended to be beneficial to both parties But there is a third party that tends to be neglected in these
negotiations women There are critics who
argue that the notion of contract farming is predicated on a unitary model of the household controlled by a male household head when in reality the household is made up of a diverse array of actors with different preferences and responsibilities As a result of this assumption of the unified household the contract is made only with a male household head although many male and female family members with diverse interests will in fact be providing labor Evidence indicates that contract farming agreements that do not pay attention to these intrahousehold gender dimensions may aggravate household and community dynamics129
By ignoring the dynamics at the micro level of local families and communities land grabbing tends to
amplify and exacerbate their gender discriminatory aspects In this sense land grabbing as a policy
ignores women bypassing the social cultural political and economic reality in which they live
Southern Tanzania has not only been the preferred location of LSLAs for domestic investors but also
for international ones Figure 8 shows that the Iringa Region (in dark red) had the most land deals
concluded 5 between 2012 and 2016 the year of the most recently concluded contract LSLAs in this
area are mainly for food crops livestock breeding and other agricultural sectors Of the five deals
three also included contract farming Here however the situation differs with regard to the womenrsquos
issue In fact one of the contracts of the type of outright purchase included that contract farming
agreement ldquobenefits 9000 grain farmers ndash around 23 of whom are women ndash and supplies 56000
poultry farmers ndash over 80 of whom are womenrdquo130 Only in one other case the gender issue has been
specified in 2014 a domestic company that invested in Tanga Region ldquoemployed 149 people the
129 Ibid 130 Land Matrix Deal 5294 Gendered-related info[website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294gender_related_info
(accessed 26 April 2021) 31
Figure 8 Regional mapping of reported transnational land deals negotiated from 2012 to 2020
majority of whom are womenrdquo131 Of course in order to assess the effectiveness and benefits of these
actions it would be necessary to check the working conditions of these women the wages they
receive and how much their employment does not affect their social life As has been said witchcraft
in Tanzania often becomes an indictment of those who enrich themselves seemingly lsquoabnormallyrsquo
compared to the rest of the community who suffer daily inequalities The question would be how a
woman who works and receives a fairly regular salary is perceived socially Could she run the risk of
being accused of witchcraft as a recipient of wealth
Pwani and Lindi are the other two regions where more transnational land deals have been concluded
From north to south Shinyanga Rukwa Tanga Morogoro Njombe and Ruvuma were the site of one
only deal from 2012 to 2020 As with the domestic deals the northern part was the least considered
and furthermore the only project in the area (in Shinyanga) which involved mining activities was
abandoned two years after the agreement was concluded132 The picture of transnational land deals
appears more blurred than that of domestic ones As mentioned earlier there is a higher rate of non-
operative projects land conflicts with local communities and a lower rate of contract farming agreed
ndash of the 16 deals 7 did not consent to it 5 did and about 2 we donrsquot know these are factors that can
influence the reaction of the local people as well as the impact on gender dynamics Moreover while
contract farming is discriminatory and marginalising for women it is not so for men small farmers
who may continue to have access to certain resources
Nevertheless the reaction of local communities may be more dependent on the unease caused by
obstacles to spontaneous access to land This situation can give rise to further tensions within
communities which have to deal with the discontent and distress of no longer having a secure source
of livelihood One effect of this tension is the recurrence to witchcraft which from being a reaction to
the uncertainty of the present triggered by structural changes becomes a source of uncertainty itself
Witchcraft endangers communities stability as allegations are often followed by violence and
harassment For example the Sukuma are aware of the impact on social stability that the accusations
and convictions of many elderly women within their communities have133 Happenings like Ruth
Zachariarsquos cannot go unnoticed by the communities themselves of which women ndash even if they are
the main victims of witchcraft-related violence ndash are part until proven otherwise
332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
Comparison between the maps in Figure 5 Figure 7 and Figure 8 tells us that land grabbing in
Tanzania over the last nine years has had a different pressure in the south than in the north In
contrast accusation of witchcraft have been much more frequent in the north than in the south This is
a very simple geographical comparison that can be questioned Nevertheless in its simplicity it can
131 Land Matrix Deal 4281 Gendered-related info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281gender_related_info (accessed 26 April 2021)
132 Land Matrix Deal7750 General info [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750general (accessed 01 March 2021)
133 Mesaki 2009 p 72 32
allow us to elaborate on other issues I have not considered all the Tanzanian ethnic groups here as
this is not strictly necessary for the purposes of the research However from the brief overview given
of the few groups presented we can claim that witchcraft suppression practices are more violent
among the Sukuma and thus in the regions around Lake Victoria in the north More people and
especially women have been killed here for witchcraft from 2012 to 2020 and for land issues in
particular However the area has not been particularly affected by land grabbing within the same
period What does this picture tell us
Firstly approaches to witchcraft vary according to ethnic group Gender inequality also depends on
this on which role and rights are guaranteed to women There are groups such as the Sukuma and
Chagga who are patrilineal and marginalise women in matters of property and inheritance On the
other hand groups like the Ihanzu who are matrilineal do not show this gender discrimination In
addition domestic arrangements are also significant Women are often in charge of food preparation
and this increases the danger of accusations of witchcraft As reported by LHRC red eyes are
commonly a characteristic feature of the witch but these are more common among women likely
elderly with prolonged and close contact with firewood used for cooking134 In many contexts women
are already vulnerable as disenfranchised and as provider of certain domestic activities In this sense
women are not safe even within their own houses
LSLAs in Tanzania have decreased in recent years as have the report of witchcraft-related incidents
Is it possible to draw a correlation then Is the accusation of witchcraft directly intertwined with land
grabbing Through the methodology utilised here it is possible to state that land grabbing is a source
of uncertainty for Tanzanian communities It is also possible to argue in relation to some ethnic
groups that witchcraft is a strategy to cope with contemporary uncertainty But a direct cause and
effect relationship between the two is difficult to assert What is the meeting point then It lies in the
marginalisation and discrimination of and against women In this sense the blanket reflects the land
and the security it provides or should provide to them by ensuring land rights Instead land whether
grabbed by neo-liberal investment policies or by members of onersquos own family makes women
extremely vulnerable Although it is not possible to assert a direct correlation between land grabbing
as a global problem and witchcraft violence it is possible to stat that witchcraft is closely linked to a
local form of land grabbing in the family or community However the latter can be negatively
influenced by land grabbing on an large scale
Large-scale investments can worsen womenrsquos situation both because of their marginalisation in
decision-making processes and because their right to land are not always guaranteed In Tanzania
accusations of witchcraft can be seen as the epitome of the deep intertwining of the land issue and
gender inequality At the same time however can we talk about a lsquowar on womenrsquo Or should we
prefer the expression of a witch-hunt Which of the two concepts best describes the picture told so
far The answer is made difficult by the fact that the two phenomena historically have often been
134 LHRC 2015 p 36 33
juxtaposed to each other to the point where it is almost impossible to distinguish one from the other
However in a hypothetical war on women the element of systematicity is of absolute importance in
the Tanzanian context there cannot be said to be a systematic deprivation of womenrsquos rights which as
we shall see have been at the centre of many policy reforms On the other hand witch hunts should be
taken with a pinch of salt accusations are not always systematic although they continue to happen and
sometimes with dramatic results In other words it can be said that the war at stake is over land and
the witch-hunt is a symptom of it As it happens women are key players in this narrative
34
4 The Land of All
In this chapter I will deepen the issue of womenrsquos land rights As has been argued so far the
marginalisation of women can increase in situations where a whole range of rights are violated or
trampled upon not strictly womenrsquos land rights but legal and human rights While it is not possible
with the available data to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between land grabbing and witch
hunt in Tanzania it is undeniable that the impact of both phenomena falls more heavily on women
This is not to say that before the new waves of LSLAs women had more rights but that in carrying
out certain practices of land expropriation deep gender inequalities are not effectively being
addressed The reasons why gender equality is such a hot topic in Tanzania are manifold and rooted in
the countryrsquos history I will not refer here to this long-standing framework but to another kind of
rootedness that on the land People live in symbiosis with the land they draw their lifeblood from it
and the care they give it ensures a mutual sustainability The land when healthy fertile and abundant
provides nourishment space to establish onersquos shelter onersquos home The land nourishes the very bond
that people share with it and with each other it becomes a space for dialogue and encounter
In contrast land can be an arena of confrontation and conflict Often conflicts themselves emerge as a
struggle for the right to land Although it is not new in recent years much attention has been paid to
the role fo women in this struggle While it may be an entire family or community that suffers from
the loss of land very often a greater loss awaits women and of a different kind The land is
responsibility but it is also security Generally in Tanzania women are not given this responsibility or
at least not in full They often have no say in terms of decision-making which may involve selling or
renting the land on which they have started a family raised their children and lived most of their lives
Therefore land is not always fair the security it provides is not always guaranteed to all without
distinction As mentioned in the previous chapter for Tanzanian women land can turn out to be
anything but security it can represent the risk of losing onersquos life because the accusation of witchcraft
becomes a death sentence
In the following paragraphs I will not try to answer why women are marginalised and discriminated
but how To answer to why one should question the patriarchal systems in place for centuries and not
only in Tanzania The how on the other hand allows us to understand the reasoning the expected and
hoped-for effects as well as the unforeseen ones of policies laws acts and social behaviours that
impact womenrsquos lives In this case I will deal with the entrenched relationship between women and
land how deep this can be and how much it can be hindered For this reason I will start by outlining
the aspects of this gendered bond with the land ndash what does it mean to have the blanket - and then
investigate whether this bond has always been respected how it is broken and what can be done to
restore it Witchcraft as another way in which womenrsquos rights are abused and violated will not be
overlooked since its connection with the land issue cannot be denied A question then might be can
ensuring land rights for women counteract accusations of witchcraft and reduce related violence
35
41 Land as a Blanket
As I previously argued echoing the OHCHR ldquolandis an essential element for the realisation of
many human rightsrdquo135 In this sense ensuring land rights means ensuring other fundamental rights
However when it comes to women the definition of land rights needs specification
ldquo[W]omenrsquos rights to land and other productive resourcesrdquo or ldquowomenrsquos land rightsrdquo mean the ability of women to own use access control transfer inherit and otherwise take decisions about land and related resources as well as womenrsquos rights to land tenure security (including community customary collective joint and individual tenure) They also encompass rights to meaningfully participate in discussions and decision-making on land law policy and programming throughout the cycles of assessment and analysis planning and design budgeting and financing implementation and monitoring and evaluation136
In the present research I have identified the land as a blanket commonly considered as a symbol of
protection security sometimes even shelter But here the blanket is also understood as responsibility
echoing Dancer ldquoWith land comes responsibilityrdquo137 The definition of womenrsquos land rights offered by
OHCHR also echoes Dancerrsquos words The reality in Tanzania however gives us another picture for
instance patriarchal and patrilineal traditions do not allow women to enjoy the rights to which they are
entitled to through statutory laws This becomes an issue when ldquoin Tanzania 80 of the population
follows a patrilineal system while 20 of the population adhere to a matrilineal systemrdquo138 This
means that from birth most women cannot be the holder of a shamba the Kiswahili word for land
plot The customary laws of many Tanzanian societies favours inheritance remaining in the male
bloodline139 This is linked to the body of customary laws regarding marriage that marginalise and
discriminate against women while at the same time guaranteeing them access to their husbandrsquos land
On one hand the woman ldquois not part of her husbandrsquos family bloodlinerdquo and disenfranchised to own
any land or property on the other hand she ldquohas[s] no prospect of being allocated lands from their
own biological families because once they get married they are expected to settle with their husbands
and accordingly enjoy user land rightsrdquo140 Through the latter therefore the woman can claim to have
a blanket albeit a vulnerable one as she may lose it once the marriage is over or the spouse dies What
follows is a lack of independence and unsurprisingly the issue of womenrsquos land rights is often
channelled into that of womenrsquos empowerment The right to land in fact goes beyond the physical and
concrete shamba converging in the full corpus of womenrsquos rights
For instance womenrsquos land rights underpin the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs) which are extremely varied and touch on several phenomena and issues In this sense
ensuring equal access between men and women to land and other productive resources becomes a135 OHCHR 2015 p 1 136 United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and
the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and Other Productive Resources New York and Geneva United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women 2020 p 9
137 Dancer 2015 p 40 138 L Magawa and M Hansungule ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in Tanzaniardquo Journal of Law
and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 p 2 139 Ibid p 10 140 Ibid p 2
36
prerogative for more pervasive gender equality By claiming that ldquowomenrsquos land rights are gateways for
women to enjoy their human rightsrdquo141 we assert that womenrsquos land rights are essential in order to
guarantee and protect womenrsquos dignity and well-being The latter is ensured when gender does not
discriminate against access to education and other services such as health care employment
opportunities consideration and respect for a person The OHCHR links securing land rights with a
range of sustainable goals from ldquoending poverty hunger and nutrition [in]securityrdquo to ldquomaking cities
sustainable combating climate change protecting terrestrial ecosystems and reversing land
degradationrdquo142 This does not mean that by ensuring land rights to women all these responsibilities
should fall on their shoulders but that women have the right to assume these responsibilities as
members of a society This is where womenrsquos empowerment understood as the ability of women to
act independently and collectively at the same time comes in The economic social political and
climate crises have a different weight according to gender and this is due to already pervasive
marginalisation of women in many spheres of decision-making and life Securing land rights for
women therefore does not mean gendering rights but making them even more accessible to
everyone
Pragmatically access to land means access to supposedly healthy and fresh food and a space on which
to build a home For women who are usually responsible both for nurturing the family and for
household tasks the land is a concrete necessity In this sense the right to land responds to short-term
needs This may be more true for women living in highly agrarian and rural societies but it is also true
in urban environments whose food and housing security are equally dependent on the availability of
land Undermining the latter in addition to the crises mentioned earlier are the commodification and
lsquofinancialisationrsquo of land which by increasing socio-economic inequalities also increases the disparity
between men and women The establishment of a land market promotes private propriety of land
access to which depends on economic and financial possibilities Here too women are disadvantaged
comparing to men This is fostered by the discourse of land rights which has mainly revolved around
ownership efficient use and productivity of land143 neglecting the emotional sentimental social and
vital value that land entails Emblematic of this process is land grabbing
Women farmers in particular are disproportionately affected by large-scale land grabs and dispossession because of their unequal access and control over land and productive assets coupled withlimited mobility and decision-making power in the household and the community and greater obstaclesin accessing justice to defend their land rights144
These arguments although global and general perfectly reflect the more local situation in Tanzania
The cultural traditional and religious aspects that govern both land issues and the relative rights of
women must also be included in this context Magawa and Hansungulersquos analysis emphasises the
aspect of womenrsquos dilemma when it comes to claiming their rights to land In general women are
141 Magawa and Hansungule 2018 p 12 142 OHCHR 2020 p 10 143 Ibid 144 Ibid p 13
37
faced with the dilemma of either breaking the status quo and denying part of their social cultural and
religious beliefs or continuing to be part of the society that has welcomed them despite inequalities
and discrimination Even if put in these either-or terms the decision is by no means trivial and easy
The land as a lsquoblanketrsquo can represent multiple securities and benefits On the other hand there is a
whole set of aspects to consider which refer to the non-economic value of land such as religious
beliefs and secular traditions that may hinder a womenrsquos choice to claim her inalienable rights Finally
the very danger of being accused of witchcraft can foster the dilemma In the balance of life what is
more valuable The security that the land represents or the certainty of staying alive In a just and fair
world this dilemma should not exist as a matter of principle However some local and global
dynamics are pulling us towards a black and white world In the following paragraphs I want to
counter this trend by emphasising the presence of other colours of alternatives to the Tanzanian
present
42 Women Rights and Policies
In section 31 I summarised the overview of land policies implemented by Tanzanian governments
which simultaneously led to the advent of land grabbing in the country and to the strategies for
counteracting its negative impacts on local communities Significant for the research topic is the fact
that successive land reforms and policies since the late 1990s have orbited around womenrsquos issue
Starting with the 1999 Land Acts (namely the Land Act and the Village Land Act) gender equality
has been included in the objectives to be achieved in order to ensure justice in terms of land rights
This can mean that women and land are part of a relationship of mutual well-being the well-being of
one leads to the well-being of the other and vice versa That is why we cannot talk about land rights
without extending them to women including them as subjects in decision-making processes If access
to land is to be equal which by the way was one of the key points of Nyererersquos socialism then women
must be included in the equation For a long time however this was not the case Both customary and
statutory laws have prevented equality between men and women This is not to say that women
enjoyed grater rights and security before the implementation of neoliberal policies and nowadays land
grabbing In other words the blanket was guaranteed to women but conditional on their social and
marital status On the other hand it cannot be denied that it is neoliberal policies and land grabbing
that have removed the prospect of having the blanket
Dancerrsquos analysis implicitly highlights that legislation itself remains caught in amoral dilemma the
choice is between maximising profits and attracting investment and adopting the discourse of equal
rights haki sawa and making it a reality Perhaps that is why Dancer quotes Issa G Shivji who states
that ldquoequality with men is necessary but not sufficient to ensure equitable access to landrdquo145 Shivji is a
Tanzanian academic who in the early 1990s was charged with setting up a commission to reform the
national land policy and related legislation146 145 I Shivji ldquoThe Land Acts 1999 A Cause for Celebration or a Celebration of a Causerdquo Workshop on Land
Morogoro TZ 1999 cited in Dancer 2015 p 52 146 Dancer 2015 p 50
38
The commissionrsquos approach was people-centred but the government took a different route and that
was not positive for women rights In the National Land Policy second edition of 1997 we read that
In order to enhance and guarantee womenrsquos access to land and security of tenure Women will be entitled to acquire land in their own right not only through purchase but also through allocation However inheritance of clan land will continue to be governed by custom and tradition provided such custom and tradition is not contrary to the Constitution147
In this way women remain subject to patriarchal and patrilineal decisions and practices And this at a
time when Tanzanian lands were already attracting foreign and national investment which undermine
land availability and access This is why Shivjirsquos statement is not out of place it simply point out that
it is not enough to promote gender equality if there are dynamics that undermine overall equality
In any case the Land Acts ldquomarked the first comprehensive statutory reform on land matters in
mainland Tanzania since countryrsquos independencerdquo148 and made ldquoTanzania one of the most progressive
African countries in its statutory commitment to gender equalityrdquo149 In fact the Land Act stipulates
that ldquothe right of every adult woman to acquire hold use and deal with land shall to the same extent
and subject to the same restrictions be treated as a right of any manrdquo150 In general the Land Acts are
seen in a positive light as they guarantee or seek to guarantee a range of rights for women that were
left out of previous legislation and policies Namely it includes in its legislation the sphere of
marriage protecting the woman in case she is threatened with alienation from her family land151
However there are other aspects of matrimonial law that are left out which respond to internal
dynamics within the couple and the community at large that may also include episodes of violence and
conflict Emblematic of these dynamics is the resort to accusations of witchcraft in the case the
woman is posing resistance or is seen as an obstacle to accessing the land This climax of violence
however occurs in the case of the woman being a widow How then can co-occupancy with the
deceased husband be guaranteed What guarantees remain for women when the marriage ends and
not only at the death of the spouse but also in the event of a divorce The Land Acts do not enshrine
the concept of ownership which ldquois not recognised in Tanzanian law todayrdquo152
The Land Acts have retained the principles of public ownership of land and the legal concept of the lsquoright of occupancyrsquo ndash including customary rights of occupancy ndash as the only recognised type of land tenure Accordingly the right of occupancy is the closest that any individual or corporate body today can come to ldquoowningrdquo land in a legal sense153
In short land belongs to no one the land is at the disposal of those who use it Yet the desire to grab
a piece of land either for oneself or to earning benefits by selling or renting it revolves around an
individualisation of land ownership Indeed ldquoone of the most significant development in land tenure
law under the Land Acts is the promotion of the individualisation of [land] titlesrdquo namely the
147 National Land Policy 1997 s 4 (25) 148 Dancer 2015 p 48 149 Ibid p 15 150 The Land Act 1999 s 3 (2) 151 Dancer 2015 p 53 152 Ibid 153 Ibid p 33
39
ldquoregistration of a right of occupancyrdquo154 Dancerrsquos fieldwork in Arusha however found that few
women try to put their names alongside their husbandrsquos on official documents certifying co-occupation
of land155 One possible explanation for this tendency is the unwillingness to transgress certain
traditional principles so internalised by women that even if they are aware of their legal rights they
prefer to leave things as they are This leads to an inconsistency between the hoped-for effects of the
implemented policies and the pragmatic effects And also here Shivjirsquos statement continues to appear
relevant
Equality promoted on paper is different from equality practised in real social relations Daley and
Englert argue that ldquoit is of course now widely acknowledged that the law alone is not enough in
securing womenrsquos land rights yet the law remains the essential starting pointrdquo156 A little later this will
also be the end point of Dancerrsquos research which continues to find obstacles to full realisation of haki
sawa What is lacking is a comprehensive approach that does not focus exclusively on guaranteeing
womenrsquos rights to land by enshrining their ability to acquire or be allocated it but which goes to
bridge the gaps that make women more disadvantaged than men in social economic and political
terms Claiming that women have full rights to acquire a piece of land does not mean that all of them
have the material possibilities to do so The situation does not improve if at the same time neo-liberal
policies lead to ever greater pressure on the land which in turn leads to intra-community and inter-
community tensions disputes and conflicts On the contrary disputes often arise within the families
themselves due to the lack of agreement on the sale or lease of land which by customary law must
have the approval of the other family members157 In Arusha Dancer found that ldquosale of family land
without knowledge or consent is a common problem Many such claims are brought by womenrdquo158
But at the same time access to justice is not easy for women Both at village and state level their
enjoyment of rights is directly proportional to their socio-economic status to how much power
relations they have to their education to their knowledge of their legal rights and languages used at
the justice level Moreover the dysfunctional nature of the state courts responsible for resolving these
disputes often discourages women and men alike from relying on them This is due to both internal
corruption and lack of funds159 For these same reasons it is often state courts that suggest that the
resolution of disputes take place ldquoat homerdquo160 Here the judgement will be according to customary
laws and thus the question of respect for womenrsquos rights comes up again It is not enough to say that
all customary laws that hinder gender equality are denied by state law if the state courts themselves
then rely on them On the other hand it is not to be denied the importance of dialogue between
customary and statutory institutions as long as it is consistently maintained
154 Dancer 2015 p 36 155 Ibid p 37 156 Daley and Englert 2010 p 109 157 Dancer 2015 p 35 158 Ibid p 3159 Ibid pp 97 and 100 160 Ibid pp 99-101
40
What is needed is political legislative social economic and cultural reform Especially nowadays
when land is not only the subject of family disputes but also of massive exploitation dispossession
grabbing and eviction which at the same time increase the severity of the former Particularly ironic
and alarming is the fact that both ldquoa womanrsquos interest in her husbandrsquos customarily inherited landrdquo161
and the right of occupancy of a non-citizen actor are classified as a derivative right162 The difference
is that the womanrsquos right is conveyed by her marriage relationship whereas that of a foreign company
must be guaranteed by the Tanzanian Investment Centre as already mentioned However investments
are often considered a benefit for the economic development of the country Are womenrsquos rights to
land considered in the same way On paper it would seem so but reality tells us a different story But
reality also tells us about people ideas and the desire for change and reform
43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo163
Talking about womenrsquos rights without engaging women risks nullifying the entire issue Feminist
organisations and womenrsquos associations have played a key role in the drafting of the Land Acts and in
the sensitivity towards gender equality Several studies were commissioned by government bodies to
monitor the actual situation In those regions that were already experiencing severe pressures on their
lands in the late 1990s ldquo[a] study found that women were enthusiastic about titling and statutory
courts that could hand down binding decisions [hellip] women were demanding full land rights
andeducation and sensitisation on womenrsquos land rights was essentialrdquo164 This essentially tells us two
things that policies are not exclusively the result of internal discussions within governmental
institutional bodies that the involvement of women and communities at large ensure that policies do
not remain just words The proper dose of pragmatism is that which arises from the encounter
between policy makers and civil society and as Daley and Englert suggest between practitioners and
academics165 as well There must be pragmatism for the benevolent intentions of laws and policies to
be considered fulfilled In this case achieving gender equality requires action in multiple spheres of
social political and economic life Land rights are widely recognised as the fertile soil from which
many other rights will begin to germinate But itrsquos really the sprouts that indicate the fertility of a soil
and even more so the goodness of the fruits it produces Therefore we cannot limit ourselves to
looking at the goodness of land rights if they are not accompanied by other equally fundamental
rights such as the right to life undermined by witchcraft accusations The Tanzanian governmentrsquos
sensitivity to these issues was not enough otherwise there would be no stories like Ruth Zachariarsquos
one Instead the lands continue to be stained with blood Certainly less than in the past but the past
cannot always be the unit of measure of progress The present here is just as important as the past if
it continues to be a space and time of inequality human rights violations discrimination and conflict
It is in the present that we need to work to ensure that in the future we wonrsquot talk about the past the
161 Dancer 2015 p 35 162 The Land Act 1999 s 20 163 Daley and Englert 2010 p 98 164 Dancer 2015 pp 51-52 165 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93
41
way we talk about it today And in the present women do not need more rights because those have
been codified multiple times but there is a need for these rights to be respected and this is already
where improvement occurs
The marginalisation of women is the obstacle to be overcome as it is land grabbing The same cannot
be said about witchcraft witchcraft is not the problem but an intrinsic aspect of Tanzanian culture
that does not necessarily lead to brutal physical violence It can lead to more subtle and insidious
violence the psychological violence of being ostracised and marginalised And yet witchcraft as a
belief should not be blamed but those negative dynamics that arise from it should As well as the
impunity that often covers those who commit violence by their own hand and those who are hidden
perpetrators This is what the LHRC denounces reporting on cases where criminals are not brought to
justice But what is really meant by justice Justice is also the principle that everyone should have the
same rights and everyone should have the same opportunity to access them At the level of land
disputes women are partially protected by legal provisions that pay lip service to the principle of
gender equality Dancer shows their limitations also by shedding light on the vacuum left by the
Tanzanian state institutions in which various NGOs and associations ndash for example the Women Legal
Aid Centre (WLAC) - have since sprung up and offer legal assistance to those who cannot afford
one166 The assistance might consist of educational projects on rights as well as on the functioning
mechanisms of the justice systems167 However although effective and efficient these initiatives alone
are not sufficient both because of a lack of funds and the mistrust of lsquoformalrsquo legal practitioners and
people alike168 Work could be done on those dynamics that lead to conflict the solution to which
should already derive from a fair and equal system of justice The idea is to act in principle providing
women and communities at large with tools to counteract forms of marginalisation In short to act by
empowerment
431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
Defining the right to land for women as essential to the entitlement of other rights means stating that
if this right - this blanket - is lost then action must be taken to get it back Pragmatism responds
precisely to this need for concreteness In Tanzania the protagonists of this pragmatism are Civil
Society Organisations (CSOs) and other territorial associations that take the demands of local
communities to heart Since 2010 fourteen of these CSOs have formed a coalition the Tanzania Land
Alliance (TALA) whose mission is ldquoto enhance equitable access to control over and ownership of
land and natural resources through community empowerment participatory research joint advocacy
and networkingrdquo169 Among the specific objectives that TALA hopes to achieve include those
promoted and promised by national policies ldquosecure tenure rights equal land rights for women
166 Dancer 2015 pp 87-90167 Ibid 168 Ibid p 89 and 101 169 ILC TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-
alliance (accessed 17 May 2021) 42
inclusive decision-making effective actions against land grabbingrdquo170 What could make the difference
between governmental and civil society commitment is the people-centred approach which exactly
mirrors the one proposed by Shivji and which through Dancerrsquos words is defined as lsquohuman-centredrsquo
The TALA experience seems to realise the ldquopositive pragmatic approach to securing womenrsquos land
rightsrdquo suggested by Daley and Englert which ldquomust have at its base the principle of gender equity ndash
the securing of equitable land rights for both women and menrdquo171 The very nature of the coalition
responds to the need for coordination not only between policies and social spheres but between
intentions and actions These fit into the multi-factorial framework I have attempted to paint in the
course of this research securing land rights is not enough if other social economic and political
dynamics stand in the way of guaranteeing them equally for all TALA pursues these demands through
coordination between its member CSOs which deal with different issues Among the fourteen
founding organisations are the already known LHRC which works in the sphere of human rights in
Tanzania and Zanzibar and WLAC whose purpose is to guarantee legal access and aid to women who
cannot afford it The latter is complemented by the work of the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association
(TAWLA) whose most recent projects dealt with land issues from the perspective of gender equality
and legal access to justice172 The strength of these organisations is their work on the ground and
involvement of local populations at large and vulnerable women aiming both at their capacity building
and at reforming and improving existing policies
All this is done within a framework of open dialogue between activists and practitioners on one hand
and communities on the other It is not only about coordination between CSOs and NGOs outside or
within the TALA coalition framework but also between social actors such as lawyers small farmers
pastors human and womenrsquos rights activists Therefore there seems to be a common awareness of the
direction the land and policy issue should take and above all on the strategies to be adopted to achieve
gender social economic legal and political equality Emblematic of this sharing of intention is the
collaboration between CSOs dealing with the situation of farmers ndash such as the Mtandao wa Vikundi
vya Wakulima Tanzania (MVIWATA) the national network of small scale farmersrsquo groups in
Tanzania - and other concerned with that of pastors ndash such as the Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous
Community Development Organisation (PAICODEO) and the Pastoral Women Council (PWC)173 It
would appear that land grabbing unites and at the same time separates these socio-economic groups
often in conflict with each other for land reasons they are now working together to make land
everyonersquos right Significant for my research topic is the role that women play in claiming not only
their own rights but those of their communities
170 ILC TALA [website]171 Daley and Englert 2010 p 93 172 Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20
May 2021) 173 Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations
(LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
43
A key event happened ldquoon April 8 2010 [when] more than 1500 Maasai women from many different
villages converged on Loliondo the headquarters of Ngorongoro Districtrdquo in Arusha Region174 This
mass mobilisation was intended to challenge the Tanzanian governmentrsquos decision to ldquoevict hundreds
of Maasai from eight villages near Loliondo to expand the hunting concession granted by the state to
the Ortello Business Corporation (OBC)rdquo175 a United Arab Emirates company Together with the
forced evictions and the land grab a series of violent acts were committed against the local population
The Maasai womenrsquos reaction was triggered by this blatant form of injustice against which their
customary practices legitimise resistance and protests176 Playing a key role although not directly
related to the organisation of the protests were the CSOs operating in the area in particular the PWC
which has carried out a ldquofearless advocacy in protecting land rights [and] had developed and
strengthened networks of women across villages through PWCrsquos membership structure thus enabling
large mobilisationrdquo177
The effectiveness of the protests can be measured by the reactions they have triggered in both law
enforcement and government bodies Dorothy Hodgson reports that ldquoAs news of the protest spread
the government started a lsquowitch-hunt for perpetratorsrsquo [italic mine] accusing CSOs leaders of
lsquofomenting the protestrsquo and threatening to close their programsrdquo178 In this case the expression ldquowitch-
huntrdquo is used as a metaphor to indicate discrediting of activists and organisations which provided
Maasai women the tools and knowledge to organise systematic resistance At the same Maasai women
are discredited as being incapable of organising protests on their own Although no actual accusations
of witchcraft have been reported this event is emblematic in showing how vulnerability and resistance
to land grabbing are two sides of the same coin the marginalisation of women does not mean that they
are unable to cope with injustice they have to resist land grabbing because it makes them more
vulnerable Even more significant is the collective spirit that drives the resistance of Maasai women
who are aware that individuality is not enough to ldquochallenge the injustices they facedrdquo179 The Maasai
women embody the collective feminism that Federici sees as the way to end this lsquowar on womenrsquo
Indeed these women seems to transcend feminism in the narrow sense to struggle for the well-being
of the community as a whole as an integral part of it In the same vein is Ruth Zacharia whose story
is given in the introduction The accusation of witchcraft she suffered because she resisted to keep her
land and claimed her rights gave rise to a desire to prevent further violence at the expense of others
Zacharia now helps her elderly neighbors report abuse and encourages younger people to take care of their parents
ldquoIf we keep quiet the oppression will continuerdquo she said watching chickens fight over grain in her front yard
174 D L Hodgson Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rights in Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017 p 133
175 Ibid p 134 176 Ibid p 137 177 Ibid p 148 178 Ibid p 148 179 Ibid p 149
44
ldquoItrsquos better now because people have got knowledgerdquo180
432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
The desire to ensure gender equality in the sphere of land rights has been repeatedly expressed by the
Tanzanian government which has then materialised it in policies and acts However civil society
local communities CSOs and NGOs continue to argue that more needs to be done The Kiswahili
proverb in the title is relevant to the issue I am addressing the will seems to come from many sides
and the way is commonly indicated in policies legislation and legal measures that make gender
equality binding
Yet there is a gap between the enacted provisions and reality What will bridge this gap is
coordination between actors and social spheres an always active dialogue between them and an all-
inclusive approach to be adopted during policy-making processes The policies are not watertight
compartments but are embedded in a kind of osmotic system by regulating human activities they
regulate a very wide range of dynamics that may appear extremely distant from each other but which
in reality are deeply connected For this reason a policy that deals with the land issue will not have
effects only in the sphere of land disputes but also on marital family community relations which in
Tanzania very often see land as a central element
Here the accusations of witchcraft are indicative of the lack of a comprehensive view of the land issue
in Tanzania This vision however is supported and carried forward by many actors in society not
only in Tanzania but also internationally In its reports from 2014 to 2020 LHRC has suggested
recommendations to counter witchcraft-related violence among these the most frequent reference is
to educating and awareness raising in society LHRC also calls on police forces to bring the criminals
responsible for the violence to justice and on the government to revise the Witchcraft Act which ldquohas
many shortcomings and has failed to address the problems caused by witchcraft beliefs and
practicesrdquo181 In the 2014 report the Centre states that the act contains contradictory provisions that
may render witchcraft as a mitigating factor in legal proceedings ldquowhen one has committed a criminal
act as a result of their belief in witchcraft used as a plea of self defence provocation or insanityrdquo182
Alongside the proposed revision of the act ndash which as of 2020 has not been reflected ndash LHRC
emphasises the need for a socio-economic solution to address what they define ldquoproblems posed by
beliefs in witchcraftrdquo183 However the problems are not primarily or exclusively posed by beliefs in
witchcraft but rather by the policies implemented that fail to fulfil one of their main functions namely
to provide the socio-economic solution to the countryrsquos problems Therefore on one hand the LHRCrsquos
contribution is to recognise the intricate relationship between different dynamics the social and
economic inequalities that are the cause and effect of witchcraft-related incidents On the other hand
180 Migiro 21 March 2017 181 LHRC 2015 p 37 182 Ibid p 38 183 Ibid
45
witchcraft as a belief is not be to condemned but rather which dynamics prompt an individual or a
group to accuse someone of witchcraft today
This phenomenon has engaged NGOs and research institutes worldwide An example is HelpAge
International that in recent years has been working on the situation of women in Tanzania especially
elderly whose vulnerability to accusations of witchcraft has already been discussed The stories
reported are very similar to those of Ruth Zacharia where accusation and punishment arise from land
disputes or the desire to grab womenrsquos land The NGO HelpAge Tanzania applied those same
recommendations suggested by LHRC and
along with other CSOs and the government initiated national awareness and sensitisation training sessions with community members in various groups Between 2014 and 2018 HelpAge Tanzania trained over 160000 people in its project catchment area in the Lake Zone regions of Shinyanga Mwanza Simyu and Geita184
HelpAge Tanzania therefore worked in the regions with the highest rate of witchcraft-related
incidents which could explain the decrease in their frequency between 2014 to 2020 at least in this
area In particular
in each village community members have been trained as paralegal advisers to provide support and advice on land inheritance and marriage rights Between 2004 and 2008 paralegal advisers dealt with almost 20000 cases Nearly half of these were disputes over inheritance and land rights mostly brought by older women
On a practical level our partners have mobilised local communities to build houses and improve sanitation facilities for women who have been threatened attacked or who have simply become isolated by the rest of the community185
The success of this NGOs work lies both in the pragmatic involvement of local communities women
and men alike and in the recognition of the central role that the land rights issue plays in the
witchcraft accusations as well as the necessity to provide legal aid HelpAge does not stand alone the
Landesa Rural Development Institute is walking on a similar path in cooperation with local actors
Monica Mhojia the Tanzania program director at Landesa186 and founder of the WLAC reminds us
of an essential aspect ldquoWhile [their] work is critical international development groups national
NGOs and local civil society groups can only do so much Itrsquos in the governmentrsquos power to bring
about widespread change and to improve the lives of widows on a wider scalerdquo187
I would add that the lives of women in general need to be improved by securing their blanket their
right to land and by preventing them from being deprived of it Awareness of the problem has largely
184 Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website] httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
185 HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania (accessed 20 May 2021)
186 Landesa is an organisation whose ldquochampions and works to secure land rights for millions of the worldrsquos poorst mostly rural women and men to provide opportunity and promote social justicerdquo Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
187 M Mhoja ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2018 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
46
been raised as have projects and initiatives to address them However more coherence is needed land
grabbing poses a danger to gender equality especially when this is already fragile For this will is not
enough pragmatism is needed
47
5 Conclusions
Land grabbing is not a new phenomenon since it involves the expropriation of land with serious
repercussions on local populations and natural political social and economic environments someone
argues that it is not very different from colonialism Stefano Liberti an Italian journalist ldquotook a triprdquo
through the Middle East the Americas Europe and Africa to find the common thread in policies that
regulate land investments At the end of his journey Liberti found in land grabbing the new face of
colonialism Regarding the Tanzanian case he focuses on jatropha production and the biofuel sector
His conclusions are the following
The great land rush feeds primarily on differences in knowledge and means it is gauged and articulated in the distance that separates rural populations who have lived undisturbed for years in theirfields and certain characters who appear out of nowhere promising them development and a route to well-being that inevitably seduces them In the various forms and shades it has taken depending on the context or the latitude land grabbing is essentially an enormous deception that deprives small farmers of their land and livelihoods either through procedures imposed by the authorities like in Ethiopia or through conjurorsrsquo tricks like in Tanzania188
Regarding Tanzania Liberti refers to the strategies implemented by investors and the national
government in pursuing land grabbing at the expense of local communities who hoped to receive
benefits or compensation for the loss of their land Their hopes have not been fulfilled in most of the
cases
The impact of land grabbing however goes beyond unfulfilled promises of development and growth
As I argue in this research land expropriation has multiple effects many of which contradict the very
development expected to come with the economic and political liberalisation Here I focused on two
main effects which can be considered as two sides of the same coin witchcraft accusations and
gender inequality Studies on gender-related effects of land grabbing are increasing given both the
globality of the phenomenon and the extent of its impacts However the latter may take on different
features depending on the socio-cultural context From Federicirsquos analysis then I ask Is it possible to
verify a direct correlation between land grabbing practices and witchcraft-related incidents in
Tanzania over the last decade And how does gender inequality play a role in this correlation
Although a cross-analysis of the available data showed that both land grabbing and witchcraft-related
incidents are not uniform across the country and often do not coincide geographically the seriousness
of the phenomena has made them central to political agendas and the network of organisations active
on the ground Both these actors ndash government institutions and NGOs - allegedly want to give the
blanket back to women
Pragmatically ensuring the blanket for women would partly mean preventing accusations of witchcraft
and related punishment be it death or isolation In short it would mean improving the life prospects
of many women who have customarily been able to rely on protection based on their marital status
Customary systems should not be indistinctly branded as retrograde and anti-gender equality on
188 S Liberti Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso 2013 p 207 48
principle As Daley and Englert argue in relation to East Africa ldquogiven that customary rules are
continually subject to change they are by definition not to be conserved as they are but to be
developed furtherrdquo189 Moreover
this leads us to suggest that a better approach to land tenure reform would be to consider how custom can be updated and reformed rather than replaced ndash on the basis that if custom is whatrsquos there it has to be worked with In the pursuit of womenrsquos land rights we can thus seek to build on what is already there while simultaneously seeking to change it190
It is necessary that both state and customary apparatuses ensure and guarantee womenrsquos rights For
this too there is a need for coordination and dialogue Given this perspective as Dancer suggests in
Tanzania it is of utmost importance adopting ldquopeople-centred ways in which local communities policy
makers and state institutions may resolve tensions between constitutional rights and customary lawrdquo191
This is necessary since such laws will continue to regulate village and community dynamics and will
therefore still play a significant role in gender relations On the other hand although Dancerrsquos works is
brilliant and suggests the same approach as I have advocated it is necessary to consider the
contemporary context six years later her publication
Land grabbing still prevents multiple categories of people from having their rights respected The
neoliberal policies implemented since the end of Nyererersquos Ujamaa gradually eroded the pragmatic
possibility of women having their rights recognised Therefore in relation to the first body of research
questions I ask what has been done or what needs to be done in terms of policies and activism to
counteract rightsrsquo violations The various attempts at reform by the government have been timely as
well as inconsistent given the continuing policies to attract land investments There was a lack of
foresight to understand that the increase of land deals transnational and domestic would have a major
impact on local communities and especially women For this reason the need for coordination should
not be limited between legal and social spheres Coordination is required to policies and intentions
themselves the Tanzanian government cannot promote land grabbing and gender equality at the same
time
In Tanzania CSOs NGOs and other organisations have shown how the land issue is closely related to
the womenrsquos issue and one symbol of this intertwining again is witchcraft Mohja argues that
ldquoalthough accusations of witchcraft are not the only reason widows are left landless or impoverished
they can be a driving factor in justifying land grabbing in the eyes of those responsible and indeed by
the community as a wholerdquo192 Mhoja helps us to identify the motives behind land grabbing and
witchcraft accusations because this is what it is about after all the expropriation of land through
abuse of womenrsquos rights The situation however is reversible
Policies are not just instruments of advantage and disadvantage Policies can work in everyonersquos favour
if they respect the principles of social gender political and economic equality What is needed for189 Daley and Englert 2010 p 100 190 Ibid 191 Dancer 2015 p18 192 Mohja 12 April 2018
49
this to happen is the adoption of a people-centred approach one that listens to and consider the voices
of civil society of the people whose lives will be regulated by these same policies Shore and Wright
argue that policies shape the people they target Policies that promote gender equality could therefore
contribute to the formation of a society that fully believes in and advocates for womenrsquos and equal
rights
TALA is a proponent of this approach having understood for instance that womenrsquos land rights
cannot be ensured without stopping land grabbing The Alliance is significant for several reasons it
represents the ability of different actors in the area to coordinate actions and intentions to achieve a
common goal and it recognised the global extension of these goals by cooperating on the
international level By joining the ILC TALA demonstrates that it accepts and promotes a people-
centred land governance which summarises the main goal of ILC ldquoto realise land governance for and
with people at the country level responding to the needs and protecting the rights of those who live on
and from the landrdquo193
In conclusion the people-centred approach must be adopted across the board when making policies
and when analysing them In the analysis conducted here on the effects of land grabbing in Tanzania
ignoring the community and ethnic dimension would have meant ignoring local dynamics related to
land expropriation and land rights In a heterogeneous environment such as the Tanzanian one ndash with
more than a hundred ethnic groups ndash policy-makers must bear in mind that certain centralised policies
will not have the same outcome everywhere At the same time this social and cultural plurality must
not prevent any attempt of a national and coherent project aimed at ensuring gender equality and
equity In order to ensure back the blanket to women and to strengthen it awareness and sensitivity to
their rights have to increase both at the customary and state level Giving the blanket back to women
would mean restoring the sense of security that land generally embodies
193 ILC Our Collective Goal [website] httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-collective-goal (accessed 20 May 2021)
50
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Baker-Smith K and Miklos Attila S B What is Land Grabbing A critical review of existingdefinitions Romania Eco Ruralis 2016
Behrman J Meinzen-Dick R and Quisumbing A The Gender Implications of Large-Scale LandDeals Discussion Paper for International Food Policy Research Institute 2011
Borras Jr S M et al ldquoTowards a better understanding of global land grabbing an editorialintroductionrdquo The Journal of Peasant Studies vol 38 no 2 2011 pp 209-216
Cotula L et al Land grab or development opportunity Agricultural investment and internationalland deals in Africa LondonRome IIEDFAOIFAD 2009
Daley E and Englert B ldquoSecuring land rights for womenrdquo Journal of Eastern African Studies vol4 no 11 2010 pp 91-113
Dancer H Women Land amp Justice in Tanzania Woodbridge James Currey 2015
DellrsquoAngelo J DrsquoOdorico P and Rulli MC ldquoThreats to sustainable development posed by landand water grabbingrdquo Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability vol 26-27 2017 pp 120-128
Di Cesare M ldquoWomen marginalization and vulnerability Introductionrdquo Genus LXX no 2-3 2014pp 1-6
Federici S ldquoWitch-Hunting Globalization and Feminist Solidarity in Africa Todayrdquo Journal ofInternational Womenrsquos Studies vol 10 no 1 2008 pp 21-35
- ldquoWomen Witch-Hunting and Enclosures in Africa Todayrdquo Sozial Geschichte Online vol 3 2010 pp 10-27
Goldman M J Davis A and Little J ldquoControlling land they call their own access and womenrsquosempowerment in Northern Tanzaniardquo The Journal of Peasant Studies 2016
Green M ldquoSorcery After Socialism Liberalization and Anti-Witchcraft Practices in SouthernTanzaniardquo in W C Olsen and W E A van Beek (eds) Evil in Africa Encounters with theEveryday Bloomington Indiana University Press 2015 pp 324-343
- ldquoDiscourses on inequality Poverty public bads and entrenching witchcraft in post- adjustment Tanzaniardquo Anthropological Theory vol 5 no 3 pp 247-266
- ldquoWitchcraft Suppression Practices and Movements Public Politics and the Logic of Purificationrdquo Comparative Studies in Society and History vol 39 no 2 1997 pp 319-345
Haram L and Yamba C B ldquoSituating Uncertainty in Contemporary Africa An introductionrdquo in LHaram and C B (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 11-28
Hodgson D L Gender Justice and the Problem of Culture From Customary Law to Human Rightsin Tanzania Bloomington Indiana University Press 2017
International Land Coalition ldquoTirana Declaration lsquoSecuring land access for the poor in times ofintensified natural resources competitionrsquordquo International Land Coalition Global Assembly Tirana ALInternational Land Coalition 2011
Kelkar G and Nathan D Witch-Hunts Culture Patriarchy and Structural TransformationCambridge Cambridge University Press 2020
51
Kendall T ldquoShop Windows and Smoke-Filled Rooms Governance and the Re-Politicisation ofTanzaniardquo The Journal of Modern African Studies vol 40 no 4 2002 pp 597-619
Lall S ldquoStructural Adjustment and African Industryrdquo World Development vol 23 no 12 1995 pp2019-2031
Land Matrix Large Scale Land Acquisitions Profile Tanzania Land Matrix 2016
Legal and Human Rights Centre Tanzania 2012 Human Rights Report Legal and Human RightsCentre 2013
- Tanzania 2013 Human Rights Report Legal and Human Rights Centre 2014
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2014 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2015
- Tanzania Human Rights Report 2015 Tanzania Mainland Legal and Human Rights Centre 2016
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2016 Mainland and Zanzibar Legal and Human Rights Centre 2017
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre lsquoUnknown Assailantsrsquo A Threat to Human Rights Tanzania Human Rights Report ndash 2017 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2018
- amp Zanzibar Legal Services Centre Tanzania Human Rights Report 2018 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2019
- State of Human Rights in Tanzania Mainland Key Issues and Highlights for the Year 2019 Tanzania Human Rights Report 2019 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
- Human Rights Protection and the Threat Posed by Covid19 in Tanzania Tanzania Human Rights Report 2020 Legal and Human Rights Centre 2020
Liberti S Land Grabbing Journeys in the New Colonialism trans E Flannelly London UK Verso2013
Magawa L G and Hansungule M ldquoUnlocking the Dilemmas Womenrsquos Land Rights in TanzaniardquoJournal of Law and Criminal Justice vol 6 no 2 2018 pp 1-19
Mesaki S ldquoWitchcraft and the Law in Tanzaniardquo International Journal of Sociology andAnthropology vol 1 no 8 pp 132-138 2009
- ldquoThe Tragedy of Ageing Witch Killings and Poor Governance among the Sukumardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 72-90
Miguel E ldquoPoverty and Witch Killingrdquo The Review of Economic Studies vol 72 no 4 2005 pp1152-1172
Mkoma S L and Mabiki F P ldquoJatropha as energy potential biofuel in Tanzaniardquo InternationalJournal of Environmental Sciences vol 2 no 3 2012
Moore H L and Sanders T ldquoMagical interpretations and material realities An introductionrdquo in HL Moore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 1-27
Mowat J G ldquoTowards a new conceptualisation of marginalisationrdquo European Educational ResearchJournal vol 14 no 5 2015 pp 454-476
52
Myhre K C ldquoDisease and Disruption Chagga Witchcraft and Relational Fragilityrdquo in L Haramand C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives StockholmNordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 118-140
National Land Policy 1997 (TZ)
Nelson F Sulle E and Lekaita E ldquoLand Grabbing and Political Transformation in TanzaniardquoInternational Conference on Global Land Grabbing II Ithaca (NY) USA Cornell University 2012
Peace R ldquoSocial Exclusion A Concept in Need of Definitionrdquo Social Policy Journal of NewZealand vol 16 2001 pp 17-36
Sanders T ldquoSave our skins Structural adjustment morality and the occult in Tanzaniardquo in H LMoore and T Sanders (eds) Magical Interpretations Material Realities Modernity Witchcraft andthe Occult in Postcolonial Africa London and New York Routledge 2004 pp 160-183
- ldquoInvisible Hands and Visible Goods Revealed and Concealed Economies in Millennial Tanzaniardquo in L Haram and C B Yamba (eds) Dealing with Uncertainty in Contemporary African Lives Stockholm Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 2009 pp 91-117
Shore C and Wright S ldquoConceptualising Policy Technologies of Governance and the Politics ofVisibilityrdquo in C Shore S Wright and D Perograve (eds) Policy Worlds Anthropology and the Analysisof Contemporary Power New York Oxford Berghan Books 2011 pp 1-25
Tarp F Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Macroeconomic frameworks for analysing the crisisin sub-Saharan Africa London and New York Routledge edn 2001
The Land Act 1999 (TZ)
The Witchcraft Act 2009 (TZ)
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner Land and Human Rights Standardsand Applications United Nations 2015
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner and United Nations Entity forGender Equality and the Empowerment of Women Realizing Womenrsquos Rights to Land and OtherProductive Resources 2nd edn United Nations and United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and theEmpowerment of Women 2020
Wobst P Structural Adjustment and Intersectoral Shifts in Tanzania A Computable GeneralEquilibrium Analysis Washington DC Research Report of the International Food Policy ResearchInstitute 2001
Sitography
Food and Agricultural Organization Family Farming Knowledge Platform Tanzania [website]httpwwwfaoorgfamily-farmingcountriestzaen (accessed 20 March 2021)
Hall M ldquoLand Grabs in Loliondo Tanzania Affecting the Maasairdquo Cultural Survival 28 March 2013 httpswwwculturalsurvivalorgnewsland-grabs-loliondo-tanzania-affecting-maasai (accessed01 March 2021) HelpAge International Womenrsquos rights in Tanzania Working with communities to stop witchcraft accusations [website] httpswwwhelpageorgwhat-we-dorightswomens-rights-in-tanzaniawomens-rights-in-tanzania(accessed 20 May 2021)
53
Human Rights Watch Land Rights [website] httpswwwhrworgtagland-rights (accessed 4 April2021)
International Land Coalition TALA Tanzania Land Alliance [website]httpswwwlandcoalitionorgenexploreour-networktanzania-land-alliance (accessed 17 May2021)
Kiishweko O ldquoTanzania takes major steps towards curbing land lsquograbsrsquordquo The Guardian 21 December 2012 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-development2012dec21tanzania-major-step-curbing-land-grabs (accessed 25 March 2021)
- ldquoCurbing Tanzaniarsquos ldquoLand Grabbing Racerdquordquo Inter Press Service 19 December 2012 httpwwwipsnewsnet201212curbing-tanzanias-land-grabbing-race (accessed 25 March 2021)
Kizito S M ldquoTanzania Adopts New Policy To Curb Land Grabbing ndash Analysisrdquo Eurasia Review 19 December 2016 httpswwweurasiareviewcom19122016-tanzania-adopts-new-policy-to-curb-landgrabbing-analysis (accessed 25 March 2021)
Land Matrix Land Matrix Welcome to the Land Matrix public database on land deals [website]httpslandmatrixorg (accessed 01 March 2021)
Transnational land deals - Deal 3886 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3886 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3880 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3880 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4765 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4765 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3885 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3885 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4717 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4717 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8394 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8394 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5293 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5293 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5295 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5295 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7750 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7750 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7785 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7785 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 7786 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7786 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4757 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4757 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5011 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5011 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4942 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4942 (last accessed 01 July 2021)- Deal 5899 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5899 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 5294 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal5294 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Domestic land deals- Deal 7796 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7796 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4507 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4507 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4925 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4925 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 4281 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal4281 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 3883 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal3883 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 7726 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal7726 (last accessed 01 July 2021) - Deal 8124 [website] httpslandmatrixorgdeal8124 (last accessed 01 July 2021)
Landesa Who We Are [website] httpswwwlandesaorgwho-we-are (accessed 20 May 2021)
54
Legal and Human Rights Centre Introduction [website] httpshumanrightsortzpageintroduction(accessed 01 March 2021)
Mhoja M ldquoBranded as Witches Stripped of Land Tanzaniarsquos Widows Need Supportrdquo The New Humanitarian 12 April 2011 httpsdeeplythenewhumanitarianorgwomensadvancementcommunity20180412branded-as-witches-stripped-of-land-tanzanias-widows-need-support (accessed 18 April 2021)
Migiro K ldquoDespite murderous attacks Tanzaniarsquos lsquowitchesrsquo fight for landrdquo Reuters 21 March 2017 httpswwwreuterscomarticleus-tanzania-women-landrights-idUSKBN16S2HU (accessed 18 March 2021)
Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania Land Tenure Support Programme-Civil Society Organisations (LTSP-CSOs) [website] httpswwwmviwataortzrecently-phased-out-programsland-tenure-support-programme-civil-society-organisations-ltsp-csos (accessed 17 May 2021)
- About us [website] httpswwwmviwataortzabout-us-2 (accessed 17 May 2021)
Ngoitiko M and Nelson F ldquoWhat Africa can learn from Tanzaniarsquos remarkable Masai land rights victoryrdquo The Guardian 8 October 2013 httpswwwtheguardiancomglobal-developmentpovertymatters2013oct08africa-tanzania-masai-land-rights-victory (accessed 01 March 2021)
Ogni Epoca ha le sue Streghe anche la nostra [online video] Presenters A Barbero and M CiardiTorino Italia Giovedigrave Scienza 2021 httpswwwyoutubecomwatchv=2Y5gDZNU27s (accessed2 April 2021)
Parakuiyo Pastoralist Indigenous Community Development Organisation PAICODEO About us
[website] httpswwwpaicodeoorgindexphpabout-us (accessed 17 May 2021)
Pastoral Women Council Empowerment for Tanzaniarsquos Maasai [website]
httpwwwpastoralwomenscouncilorg (accessed 17 May 2021)
Schertow J A ldquoMaasai women taking bold stance to protect land rightsrdquo Intercontinental Cry 24 April 2013 httpsintercontinentalcryorgmaasai-women-taking-bold-stance-to-protect-land-rights (accessed 01 March 2021)
Statista The Countries Most Affected by Land Grabs [website]httpswwwstatistacomchart19044countries-most-affected-by-land-grabs (accessed 19 March2021)
Tanzania Women Lawyers Association Our History [website] httpswwwtawlaortzour-history (accessed 20 May 2021) The United Republic of Tanzania Tanzania Investment Centre About Us [website] httpwwwticgotz (accessed 10 April 2021)
Wikipedia Hernando de Soto [website] httpsenwikipediaorgwikiHernando_de_Sot28economist29 (accessed 20 March 2021)
Womenrsquos UN Report Network Tanzania ndash Witchcraft Accusations [website]
55
httpswunrncom202012tanzania-witchcraft-accusations (accessed 20 May 2021)
World Bank Rural population ( total population) ndash Sub-Saharan Africa [website]httpsdataworldbankorgindicatorSPRURTOTLZSlocations=ZG (accessed 8 April 2021)
- Tazania [website] httpswwwciagovthe-world-factbookcountriestanzania (accessed 20 March 2021)
Appendix
Below the political map of Tanzania indicating all the Regions provided as a support for the reader
The map has been downloaded from OnTheWorldMapcom Tanzania regions map [website]
httpsontheworldmapcomtanzaniatanzania-regions-maphtml (accessed 03 June 2021)
56
- 1 Introduction
-
- 11 Overview
- 12 Objective and Research Questions
- 13 Background and Relevance
-
- 2 Pathways to Research
-
- 21 Theoretical Frameworks and Concepts
-
- 211 Land Grabbing and Womenrsquos Rights
- 212 Witchcraft and Uncertainty
-
- 22 Methodology and Source Materials
- 23 State of Research
-
- 3 The Land of Witches
-
- 31 Land Grabbing in Tanzania A Policy Overview
-
- 311 Land Grabbing in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 312 Meeting Local Communities
-
- 32 Land Rights and the Uncertainty of the Present
-
- 321 Witchcraft in Numbers From 2012 to 2020
- 322 Meeting Ethnic Groups
-
- 33 Conclusions The Uncertainty of Land and the Land of Uncertainty
-
- 331 Does less Land equals more Witches
- 332 Witch Hunt or War on Women
-
- 4 The Land of All
-
- 41 Land as a Blanket
- 42 Women Rights and Policies
- 43 Conclusions ldquoA proper dose of pragmatismrdquo
-
- 431 Taking Back the Blanket Taking Back the Land
- 432 Penye nia ipo njia ldquoWhen therersquos will therersquos a wayrdquo
-
- 5 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Sitography
- Appendix
-
