Video: Papiya - Maasai and single mother

Papiya had no support when her husband left her. Traditionally, women are not allowed to own land in that area in Tanzania. But Papiya went to the village council and was assigned a plot.

Video produced by Rasmus Hundsbæk from DK4 in cooperation with MS ActionAid Denmark

 

Text: Pernille Bærendtsen

Papiya Ndaadu is a middle-aged woman with a wrinkled face where a hard life has left its traces. She lives in Orpopong'ni – a small village about 40 minutes by car from Kibaya, the district capital of Kiteto which is situated in Maasailand in central Tanzania.

"This is my land, from that tree to this tree, around and up to these trees and that large tree," Papiya explains, while she points to all four corners of the world to show how far her land goes.

To Papiya the land plays a crucial role in her life:

"I have four children, two of whom are in school. Everything I get from my land I use to support them. The money she makes from selling crops from the land, she uses to buy cows or goats, which in turn can generate revenue."

Home in the boma – the family’s compound – she tells her story. She identifies every house in boma: "This is my house; this is my father's house, my sister’s house and my uncle’s house."

Papiya explains that her problems began when her husband disappeared. He simply just went away and left her with the children.

"I had nothing," she explains.

Papiya had no alternative but to return to her parents' village, where she later discovered that she could ask the village council for a plot of land. She managed to get the plot allotted which she showed earlier in the day.

But it was not easy to start with: "Before, we, the women, were unaware of the importance of land.

People were not used to cultivate land, and when they first began to cultivate the land, it was only men who used to own it."

CORDS has the last 10 years taught both men and women in the village of Orpopong'ni about their rights in regard of the Tanzanian Land Acts, and has also helped the village to demarcate its boundaries with other villages and helped them to spread the land internally. This process has helped to ensure that Papiya and other women have had the piece of land allocated which they can now cultivate.

"If not for CORDS I had not known that women can own land. And it is due to CORDS I went to the village council. Because I have no man, but four children, the village council could understand my problems. They knew that I did not have anybody else to ask for help and no one else I could ask for to support my children. The fact that I can cultivate my own land means that I can support my children's education, buy clothes, goats, food, and when I am sick, I can afford to go to hospital."

It is very simple: "The land is my livelihood", concludes Papiya.