The Ogiek believe they arrived in the Mau forest in the Kenyan Rift Valley as a punishment, banished by their god for the crime of killing an elephant. He told them they could only ever eat food from the forest.

Since then they have eked out a living gathering honey from hollow trees and homemade hives.

“Now it’s not a punishment. We love it here and will never leave,” said Simon Romchura, a tribal elder, sitting in the shade of a cedar tree.

Their way of life, though, is threatened by the tribal violence that erupted in Kenya after last December’s disputed elections, according to a report published today by Minority Rights Group International. More than 1,000 people died in January and February.

Vast tracts of their forest were set alight by rival communities and a deal hatched between political rivals has failed to ease ethnic tensions, the report cautions, leaving small tribes such as the Ogiek – among Africa’s last hunter-gatherers – living in fear.

Daniel Kobei, of the Ogiek People’s Development Programme, said: “Our people have received no help at all.

Their houses were burnt to the ground. Tensions between the Kikuyu villages and the Ogiek are still high.”

The Ogiek supported the opposition Orange Democratic Movement in the elections, hoping that a new president would help their precarious existence. That support put them at odds with surrounding communities of Kikuyu tribesmen loyal to President Kibaki.

Activists who work to protect the 10,000 Ogiek believe that the Kikuyu used the election violence as a cover to seize the forest, burning more than 600 families from their homes.

It is not the first time that their ancient way of life has been threatened. Beneath Mr Romchura’s shady vantage point lies a plain dotted with the charred stumps of a thousand cedars. This growing wasteland is the legacy of Daniel arap Moi, the former President, who parcelled out plots of the forest to his friends and Kalenjin tribal supporters.

Every day the forest continues to shrink as lorries roll out of the woods laden with tree trunks.

Without the trees, the Ogiek would lose their bees and Africa would lose a unique people whose entire way of life is centred on honey.

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