The first female Maa chief

Kajiado,Kenya: On the scorched hills of Oldorko in Olkiramatian East in Kajiado County the wind of change is blowing. The same wind that handed the county its first ever woman MP has given this area its first woman chief.

Margaret Nadupoyi Lemayan joins the roll of honour of women leaders in Kajiado. Ahead of her at the high table is the first Maasai woman MP Peris Tobiko, MP for Kajiado East constituency, elected in 2013.

On March 5, 2014, Lemayan broke another cultural jinx dramatically; she was appointed the first woman Maasai chief. To achieve this historic title, Lemayan floored six men.

The 35-year-old mother of two also made history by becoming the first Maasai woman to go head-to-head with her husband in a race for public office in an exercise marked by drama and controversy

“I was third time lucky,” Lemayan says with a cheeky smile.

“This time they failed to rig me out. The officials were apparently fed up with the male bigotry that characterised the exercise in the area.”

Lemayan beat a strong field of six men to claim the throne of Chief of Oldorko. This is in Magadi East constituency, Kajiado County.

Lemeyan first contested the post in 2005. Interestingly, her husband also vied for the post.

“There were dramatic scenes on the way to the DC’s office in Kajiado where the interviews were being conducted.”

lag behind

“My husband and I left the house together, but I had to walk slowly to give him a head-start. In the Maasai culture a man cannot be seen walking with a woman. He begged me to spare him the embarrassment and lag behind. In the end, there was at least a kilometre between us,” Lemayan explains.

But on this occasion Lemayan was not successful. Both her and her husband failed the interview.

She had another shot at the post in 2011, and this time she passed the interview with flying colours, but the elders would not let her assume the post.

“The elders ganged up to protest my being installed as chief. They vowed not to allow a woman to lead them,” she says.

The protests were politically charged. The provincial administration then was forced to overturn her appointment and settle for the second best candidate; a man.

She and her supporters, men and women, protested. They went to the DC and Member of Parliament’s offices to protest the move.

“The DC and MP said they understood my pain. But apparently, they were powerless in the face of fierce opposition to my candidacy,” she says.

But not one to be easily discouraged, Lemayan did not give up hope.

“I promised myself that I would fight on. Fortunately, my husband who was also in the race for the second time was very supportive.

“Being a school teacher and someone who had gone to school, he was less radical than the elders and kept encouraging me,” she says.

Come last year in March, Lemayan again crushed the male opposition at the interview stage, emerging the best.

With the officials firmly intent on appointing her chief this time, the elders hatched another plot to cause chaos and interrupt the handover ceremony in Oldorko.

“They collected more than Sh50,000 with each donating between Sh300-3,000 to disrupt the ceremony,” she says.

However as fate would have it, Lemayan was destined to be crowned chief.

“Only a handful of the so-called protesters turned up. Others hid in the bushes and started to emerge one by one and joined the cheering crowd as I delivered by acceptance speech,” says Lemayan.

Opposition to her leadership did not, however, end on that day. On another occasion months after her installation, a group of elders tried to stop her from giving a speech at a school function claiming they could not be addressed by a woman.

“I stood my ground and dared anyone who was opposed to my being there to leave the meeting immediately,” she says.

Today, as Lemayan settles down in office and the community begins to come to terms with her leadership, she has set her eyes on a few goals.

fighting fgm

“I want to encourage more girls to go to school. And to this end, I have come out publicly to condemn and fight female genital mutilation which keeps thousands of Maasai girls out of school.”

Already, Amref Kenya has identified Lemayan as one of the key Government contacts in the area in its campaign against FGM and  for the Alternative Rites of Passage (ARP) programme.

Lemayan underwent FGM as a young girl; an experience which saw her fight tooth and nail to acquire an education.

“At one point my mother, Kitayion Nadonyea, had to sell hundreds of goats to pay my school fees. In the end, the money raised was only enough for my shopping,” she says.

After circumcision, her father, Nadonyek Kolei, was intent on marrying her off but Lemayan fought on to study until she completed her secondary education at St Mary’s Girls’ Narok after which she joined college to study information technology.

She even got a job as an assistant to a high flying airline CEO.

In her quest for leadership, Lemayan, who is a serious farmer in Endasopia, also served in Maendeleo ya Wananawake.