A History of the Pastoral Way of Life in the Awash Valley, Ethiopia

Abstract

The main objective of this seminar paper is to explore pastoral way of life in the Awash Valley. It is well known that pastoralism is a way of life mostly found in Africa that is based on raising livestock and using mobility as a fundamental technique for livelihood development and risk management system. In Ethiopia, there are a total of twenty nine pastoralist group. Yet, this seminar paper focuses on Debne Afar, the Karrayu, Arsi, Ittu, Jile, and Issa-Somali, the six pastoralist groups traditionally inhabiting on the Awash valley. Many research studies are conducted around pastoralism in Ethiopia by depending and explaining on the conflict between pastoralists, economic activities, and those prone to drought. However, the present seminar paper wants to fill a gap in providing a detailed examination with historic narratives available documents on the way of life and interaction of pastoralists in the Awash valley, conflict and traditional resolution mechanisms, government policy towards pastoralists, assess drought and traditional mitigation measures, which are the main focus of this paper. The survey of literature is restricted to the published secondary materials of books, reputable with peer reviewed journals, articles and unpublished materials of report, MA thesis and PhD dissertations that have been available to this writer to date. In conclusion, there are certain aspects of the pastoralist way of life that lessons can be drawn from their practices, unlike other pastoralist groups. Afar was able to found an organized local state of Aussa in 1577 AD under the leadership of Mohammed Jassa around Awash valley, still local clan leaders continued old administrative functions. The Karrayu pastoralists also began to intermingle and intermarry with Ittu pastoralist communities in the study area for a long period of time. There are a number of frequent conflicts in pastoral communities. However, the major conflicts are Afar agains. Karrayu and Afar fight Issa-Somali clan was dominant ones. vis-à-vis of their conflict most pastoralists in the Awash valley in thier long history have been able developed traditional conflict resolution mechanisms such as the Ittu Oromo have had belief systems known as Abarsa and Kakku, the unwritten rangeland pastoral law of the Issa–Somalia clan, also known as Heer Issa, and the Afar pastoralists also have a strong traditional clan leader named Finna.