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Winning War Against Women Trafficking in Nigeria

The trafficking in women and children in the society has become a major source of worry to many concerned individuals, governments, non-governmental organisations and civil societies.

Nigeria has been ascribed to have the highest number of children and women traffickers in Africa. The rate at which the trade occurs has made some persons to describe it as an endemic disease, which the government must be relentless in combating.

Women and child trafficking can be defined as the transportation of children and women (young ladies and adults) from one place to another either as child labour, sexual commodities or professional prostitutes who have their bodies for money or engage in other menial jobs for which there is neither future nor special skills.

Trafficking as it were, occurs in two ways, which are internal and external trafficking.

Internal trafficking occurs when the victims, especially young boys and girls, are moved from rural areas or communities to urban area to become house helps, hotel attendants, and nannies. The girls usually end up as satisfiers of the sexual urge of their masters, if they are in families or customers of the hotel or beer palours where their services are used.

External trafficking involves transporting victims from 10 years and above from their country for the aim of prostitution and child labour. Ironically, while some victims of trafficking persons are unassuming and innocent individuals, others especially the ladies allow themselves to be trafficked all for the purpose of monetary gains. One of the countries for this ugly trend is Italy.

While civil societies and non-governmental organisations have carried out several campaigns against trafficking in persons, the Nigeria government had made notable efforts towards the deportation and rehabilitation of the women in the past few years.

Aside ladies who get involved willingly in women trafficking, parents especially mothers have aided in the trade. Parents give out their girl-children or encourage them as a result of economic hardship and the level of ostentatious living that most of other girls on return from their trip display.

Most parents are unaware that some women solicit for their daughters’ involvement in the batch of young girls to be sent out of the country for prostitution or slavery. They arrange for payment by the traffics while the innocent girls suffer. In most cases the girls are made to take an oath to behave and do anything she was asked to do by her slave master or mistress and also warned not to attempt an escape.

At the end, most of these girls die in the process, those who do not die contact dreadful diseases like the HIV/AIDS or are rendered useless for life.

Some other children who are not involved in the sexual escapades are subjected to child abuse. They are made to engage in tasks that are too difficult for them – fetching of water with pots that are too heavy for their age, hawking in the streets. In some cases, these children become victims to kidnappers for ritual purposes. They are not sent to school, and when they grow up, become social miscreants and haters of the society in which they live. Some, at the end turn out to be armed robbers, molesting the society.

Organisations like Women Political Action Committee (WPAC) on women trafficking, International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the UNICEF have been in the forefront of fighting this social plague. Their efforts have been on not only discouraging girls and mothers from such acts and emphasising the danger but also suggesting ways they could be useful to themselves and make money the proper way.

In Rivers State, the wife of the former Governor of the state, Justice Mary Odili had through The Adolescent Project (TAP) re-focused the minds of young and susceptible children to the acquisition of skills that would make them responsible in life. Many young boys and girls have been trained in skills ranging from tie and die, sewing, hairdressing, paint making and others. This gesture had in no small way redirected these youths from engaging in acts that would be inimical to their lives, their families and those of the society.

Thousands of these adolescent were graduated, equipped to be independent during the eight years of Dr. Peter Odili’s administration through the wife.

An NGO in Calabar, known as Girls Power Initiative (GPI) has been fighting against sexual exploitation of teenage girls in Cross River State. The founder of the NGO, Prof. Bene Madunagu, to empower the girls in the area opened a vocational training centre. She saw the idea of the centre came with the realization that girls from the poor homes were more vulnerable to sexual exploitation than those from well-to-do families.

Economic empowerment of the girl-child is the surest way to make her independent and protect her from sexual exploitation and prostitution. This programme is all about self-employment on adulthood, she had said. The essence, she explained further, is to make girls realize their God-given talents which can tomorrow become their source of livelihood.

At the international level, the United Nations (UN) and UNICEF have urged eastern and southern African nations, where it says more than eight million children live in dire poverty, to halt the boom in child trafficking. Per Engebak, UNICEF’s regional director for eastern and southern Africa warned that unless swift action was taken, the region was poised to become a major supplier of trafficked children often subjected to sexual and physical abuse.

Traffickers are exploiting the aspirations of those living in dreadful conditions with virtually no risk of prosecution. “In many countries, the absence of a specific law on child trafficking is a serious loophole that undermines the global effort to stop child trafficking” he said.

UNICEF acknowledged that existing laws often address certain aspects of trafficking, such as kidnapping, rape or sexual exploitation, but fall short of punishing perpetrators for the crime itself. “Only Mozambique and South Africa have made progress in enacting domestic legislation against child trafficking” UNICEF said, urging other countries to follow suit.

The UN agency on its part warned that global human trafficking, which spawns an estimated seven to 10 billion dollars annually is expanding to regions. Though child-women trafficking seem to be an African affair, there is need for countries and individuals to help the government in its prevention and stoppage. 

Adapted from: "Winning war against women trafficking." The Tide Online. 21 June 2007.