This project, Bringing In the Voices of Elders, takes TICAH’s years of work with indigenous elders around health and peace to another level. This project focusses on two difficult social issues that Maasai and Mijikenda communities are facing. Communities where TICAH has built strong relationships. The treatment of girls by the pastoralist Maasai and the abuse of elders amongst the Coastal Mijikenda are two of the thorniest social problems of today and are in part caused by a conflict between past practise and present need. The aim of the project is not to bring back the past since our world today is different. Let’s listen and learn from the voices of those who know the deep values in the traditions. Let’s bring what is useful from that wisdom. Let’s create a Kenya where daughters can also become doctors, where sons find new ways to survive, where elders are not seen as a threat to change, but can help change happen.

Bridging the intergenerational gap to improve the lives of girls and the elderly 

Bridging the generational gap, Bringing in the Voices of Elders project focused on two difficult social issues facing the Maasai and Mijikenda communities; the treatment of girls by the pastoralist Maasai and the abuse of elderly persons among the coastal Mijikenda, which is partly caused by conflict between past practices and the present needs.  In the Maasai community girls and women are not treated as equal partners in their homes while the youth of Mijikenda community regard elders as those practicing witchcraft in the name of culture and tradition. This was further complicated by the rising cases of false healers who always cited and blamed witchcraft for illnesses or misfortunes, with an elderly person always being evil. The aim of the project hence is not to bring back the past since the world has changed and is different today, but to promote the community to listen and learn from the voices of those who know the deep values in traditions and bring out what is useful from their wisdom. The project saw the vision of a community where daughters can also become doctors, sons find new ways to survive and elders are not seen as a threat to change but as those who can support the change to happen. A baseline study was conducted to identify and prioritise the intervention response. 

Through regular intergenerational dialogues about common positive values and tradition, these fears and tension slowly began to dissipate. More on this journey captured in their own voices can be found here:

In Kilifi, youth and elders are now organising cultural events together after building mutual respect for each other.  The youth have embraced their cultural ceremonies and established cultural centres to showcase their traditional music and dances.  These are young people who,  at the beginning of the project,  saw anything cultural as fearful and sinister.  They have also begun planting and selling tree seedlings as an income-generating activity. Some of the youth who had no confidence in speaking about their culture or wearing their cultural attire has now changed and can now easily and publicly adorn sarongs.  As for the elders, many have become outspoken activists for their rights and protection.  These are the same old men who were once dying their hair to appear younger for fear of being recognised as elders and branded as witches and their rights denied. Elders are now using motorbikes operated by young people, they did not them before as they were too afraid of their intentions.    They are more open to share with younger generations about cultural practices,  values,  symbols and plant medicine. Elders are inviting more young people into the Kayas (sacred forests). The work that has taken place within the Mijikenda community has sparked a reconnection of young people to their traditional cultures.  With this reconnection and growing relationships between generations, elders are finding more confidence and security to work with the young to solve community challenges. 

As a result of the project, the county government of Kilifi is also creating a new policy to register traditional healers to weed out the false ones and this will involve vetting by village elders. There are also plans to open up all the Kaya sacred sites to the public to demystify the belief that they are used for witchcraft while they are actually prayer sites. subsequently, UNESCO introduced an annual award to reward well maintained Kayas with access to the public being one of the main criteria to be used. County department of lands has also began a series of community meetings to educate the elderly on the legal issues on land ownership and transaction to make them family land, in response to increased incidences of killing of elderly people to dispossess them of their land.  

“TICAH encouraged us to speak up as elders and we in turn encouraged this within ourselves because we believe that if we do not speak about our problems, they will continue affecting us.”  Mr. Garero, Head of Kaya elders, Kilifi 

In Kajiado, some girls have been given more choices within their families, choice in terms of if they want to stay in school or if they want to get married.  Before the project, they had no decision-making authority at all.  Better relationships have also emerged between girls and their fathers as fathers are more involved in their daughters’ lives; asking how they are doing,  asking about school,  and generally showing interest in their wellbeing as they can sit together and talk. This is very significant for a  community where it is common for fathers and daughters to have no relationship. These were achieved by building connections between elders and youth through intergenerational meetings, trainings and workshops to provide knowledge and skills on gender, land, inheritance, livelihoods, traditional values and contemporary life, radio shows and community discussions (through parents meetings, school open days and clubs, youth camps, and meeting other stakeholders) as well as follow-ups and support of community initiatives. The team also utilized peace walks and cultural ceremonies 

One of the challenges encountered in the implementation of the project was the government delocalisation of schools in 2018 with the transfers of school teachers who had been engaged in the project, having to wait to engage new ones hence delaying the implementation process. Additionally, in Kajiado, it is culturally inappropriate to call a community meeting and only accept particular participants which led to intergenerational meetings. It was however later learnt that while men and fathers may be the financial gatekeepers and ultimate decision makers for their families, it is the mothers who hold the responsibility of communicating and negotiating with their husbands on behalf of the children. It was also learnt that brothers and not fathers have more power in protecting young girls because they are out there more with their sisters in the community and at school.

More of the stories can be found in the below links; 

Bringing in the Voices of Elders (Kajiado):

Bringing in the Voices of Elders (Kilifi): 

Radio Shows: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1JyFnEj712chTsc0mi_99xVgpSmalm-zU?usp=sharing