KENYA:Ten thousand Ogiek eke out a living collecting honey and fruit in the Great Rift Valley's Mau Forest, but extinction looms as their habitat is ruined, writes Rob Crilly
The Ogiek believe they arrived in the Mau forest as a punishment, banished by their god for the crime of killing an elephant.
He told them they could only ever eat food from the forest. Since then they have eked out a living collecting honey, gathering fruits and hunting the occasional antelope.
"Now it's not a punishment. We love it here and will never leave," said Simon Romchura, a tribal elder sitting in the shade of a spindly cedar tree.
But as Kenya teeters on a knife-edge of tribal tension, their ancient way of life is under threat from all sides. This week forest fires have raged across their ancestral home. Dozens of houses have been burned and hundreds of families are sheltering in schools.
One of their leaders is in hiding after receiving a death threat. In all, more that 1,000 people have died in violence across Kenya since December's disputed elections. For the Ogiek though, politics is only an excuse used by tribes with ulterior motives.
"There are a lot of people trying to take our land now. The Kalenjin and Kikuyus are all fighting each other to take our land," said Romchura.
This is not the first time the 10,000 or so Ogiek of the Mau Forest, perched on the edge of the Great Rift Valley, have faced extinction.
Beneath Romchura lies a plain dotted with the charred stumps of thousands of cedars. It is the legacy of former president Daniel arap Moi, who parcelled out plots of the forest to his friends and tribal supporters. And every day the forest continues to shrink as lorries trundle out of the woods laden with tree trunks.
The Ogiek, like most of Kenya's tribes, supported the opposition Orange Democratic Movement in December's disputed elections, hoping that a new president would help their precarious existence.
It has left them at odds with the Kikuyu communities living around the forest, from the tribe of president Mwai Kibaki.
Campaigners working with the Ogiek, one of east Africa's last hunter gatherer tribes, say land is at a premium when hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced by tribal clashes.
"As Kenyan tribes have returned to their tribal homelands for safety during the violence, the Kikuyus centred around the town of Nakuru have realised they will need farms. The Ogiek live on the perfect land," said one activist.
At the same time, the forest fires are blamed on members of the Kalenjin tribe, opposition supporters who have been expelled from Kikuyu land. They want to clear the forest to build new homes.
Kiplangat Cheruiyot, of the Ogiek Peoples' Development Programme, said his people were now living in fear.
"We lost 54 houses and around 600 Ogiek families have been displaced," he said. "We've been suffering food shortages such as beans and cooking oil, lack of warm clothes - it's cold and raining now - and blankets. The displaced families are now staying in schools, in very poor conditions." The Ogiek are famous for their cultivation of honey in simple wooden hives scattered throughout the forest.
Some is used to make beer and some is sold to neighbouring tribes. Brides are expected to arrive in their new homes with bottles filled with honey for their new relatives.
Campaigners say they also serve as guardians of the forest, protecting it from overuse. Miriam Ross, of Survival International, said the Ogiek were a living part of human history.
"They are among the last hunter gatherers in east Africa, so if their rights to the land are not protected and if they are unable to continue living as Ogiek, then an important part of human diversity and their culture would simply disappear," she said.