Peris Tobiko wants to become the first Maasai woman MP

Published on September 20, 2007, 12:00 am

By Isaac Ongiri And Joe Ombuor

If Maasai custom had its way in Ms Peris Pesi Tobiko’s life, she would have fallen victim to any of the three attempts to force her into an early marriage. But because of her determination to get an education, enhanced by assistance from teachers and other well wishers, Peris is today one of the most outstanding women among this conservative Maa-speaking community.

Indeed, Peris is the first Maasai woman to become a District Officer (DO) and now the first woman from this community to aspire for a parliamentary seat. Peris wants to wrest the Kajiando Central parliamentary seat from General (Rtd) Joseph ole Nkaissery in the coming General Election.

Outstanding performance

"If my community’s customs had their way, I would have been married off soon after I sat my CPE in 1981. I was only 14-years-old and was the best girl in this exam in the whole of the Rift Valley Province. Because of this outstanding performance, many enlightened women in the neighbourhood together with my former primary school headmaster came to my rescue. They prevailed upon my father to allow me to join Form One," she recounts. Her father obliged, but his bag was still full of tricks.

Picture this: although Peris had been invited to join Alliance Girls’ High School, her father took her to Moi Girls Isinya on the outskirts of Kajiado, where he could reach her easily for another arranged marriage attempt.

In fact, a second attempt while in this institution leaked to her former primary school teachers, who informed the secondary school’s management. "The teachers restricted my movements to ensure my safety. They knew Maasai morans were capable of abducting me if I were allowed to go out," she says.

This time around, she says, the suitor’s side would not rest until they got what they wanted. Peris’s stepsister offered herself to settle a dowry debt incurred by their father on his second attempt to marry Peris off.

"When the second attempt failed, my stepsister was married off to the man in my place," she says.

The ravaging drought of 1984 found Peris in Form Three. And the demon of forced marriage was still abroad in the land. Because Peris’s father lost a substantial part of his livestock to the drought, he saw in his daughter a shortcut into replenishing his lost herd. He chose a 60-year-old man to marry his daughter as a third wife. But the Moi Isinya Girls’ Principal couldn’t take that lying down either. Instead, the teacher secured for Peris a scholarship from the Jomo Kenyatta Foundation. In the unfolding scenario, it was becoming clear to the teacher that Peris’s father was not going to pay for his daughter’s education.

"And, moved by my plight, World Vision also stepped in to boost this scholarship," she recalls.

That scuttled a well-planned go at Peris’s social life. The elderly suitor had paid her father an initial part of the bride price in the form of milk, a blanket and a few cows. The items were later returned, she remembers.

After doing well in her Form Four exams she became a little safer from future arranged-marriage attempts. She joined Moi High School Kabarak for her A-Levels and later went to the University of Nairobi, where she graduated with a degree in Political Science.

Mr Right

When she felt her time to get married was ripe, she had her choice of Mr. Right in Kishana ole Suuji. Peris took Suuji to her parents for introduction and blessings before they took each other’s hand in marriage. But she was to be received with another shocker: Her father wanted a whopping Sh1.5 million as dowry.

It took Peris a while to convince her father that she was not an item on sale. When he finally bought the idea, he allowed his daughter to have her way. "We are now best-of-friends and my father often visits me in my city home," she says.

So who is Peris as an administrator and now a politician?

The now 39-year-old Peris was posted to Embu District as a DO in 1994. She served in this capacity briefly before she won a government scholarship to study a master’s degree in International Relations. She graduated in 1997, but did not go back to her provincial administration work, instead opting to take up another job — as a benefits officer with the National Social Security Fund, from where she resigned last July to go into politics.

At the national level, Peris’s is the interim deputy national chairman of ODM-K. And at the constituency level, Peris’s quest for political leadership is unique and perhaps even noble. She says her main agenda in active politics is to emancipate the Maasai girl and woman from the yokes of social, economic and political sexism. The mother of three believes she has won the first round in this endeavour because her candidature has been blessed by many Maasai elders in the constituency.

She says, "I am not just in the race to Parliament without having done my homework thoroughly. I already have the blessings of hundreds of male elders from Kajiado Central. They have endorsed my candidature and this shows that men from this community are willing to change their perception about women in leadership," she says.

Apart from politics she has been involved in a massive anti-female circumcision crusade in the constituency, where she has been able to rescue between 300 and 500 girls from forced circumcision or early marriage or both.

She is already a role model to many girls and women. But if you think her efforts to empower the Maasai girl and woman has made her an enemy to all men and every tradition in this society, you are terribly mistaken. Peris says, "My campaign team involves men, women and the youth of both genders. My approach is diplomatic and I embrace all valid cultural edicts. And where a rite or belief is supposed to be ignored or discarded, we tackle it carefully without making ourselves outcasts to the conservative lot. We know a culture revolution is a process that takes time."

But Peris still concedes that some men cannot avoid sexism. Among these people, she says, she is seen as the odd politician out. But she is still confident of winning the vote and sending Old Soldier Nkaissery home and into a second retirement.