Wild life | 2 November 2017

Laikipia

  Flying home across Laikipia’s ranchlands with Martin after a farmers’ meeting, I see the plateau dotted with cattle and elephants. Stretching away towards the north, it is all green after good rains. I think to myself that farming is hard enough without having to deal with toxic politics: will there be a drought, and what about the ticks, or foot-and-mouth disease; will your cattle get rustled, or flocks of quelea and hordes of zebra devour your crops? After months of politics in Kenya, the news comes in that Uhuru Kenyatta has been declared our president again. This comes as a great relief because most people in Kenya are exhausted by politics after months of crisis. We just want to get back to work. Everybody is broke. At least under Kenyatta we reckon our title deeds will be respected and private businesses have a chance to survive. None of this is thanks to our western diplomats. A few months ago Boris Johnson visited Kenya and there was a party at the British High Commissioner’s residence. After the wine had flowed a bit, the deputy high commissioner John Murton, who is the size of an Oompa Loompa, came up and started shouting at me. I had been rude about his boss Nic Hailey in this column and he was not happy about it. I suggested we go and discuss matters over a whisky. Murton produced a decent single malt and we went off and sat down together in a quiet room. I explained that private investors struggling with the turmoil in Laikipia did not feel we had the support of Britain during our troubles. He said the FCO was doing what it could, and so on. After a while Murton said, ‘If you don’t like it, why don’t you just sell up and leave?’ After 130 years in Africa I felt that was pretty unfair but my response was, ‘In the current circumstances, even if I wanted to sell up, I doubt anybody would offer me even 2,000 bob for my farm.’