Image: Courtesy
Original Story: VOA
National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) is repatriating and re-settling women who have been subjected to forced labor and prostitution. The women were smuggled to Europe on false promises of getting well-paying jobs. Thousands of Nigerian women have been trafficked in recent years, though some are lucky enough to return to their country.
Many end up in Europe, after traveling under extremely precarious conditions. Then comes the shocker of being forced into prostitution 24/7, 360 days year in, year out.
More than 11,000 persons are estimated to be working as sex slaves in Italy alone.
Beatrice a victim recounts her suffering was unbearable. She said, “If you don’t come back with money, they’ll beat you up, do different things. They give you fresh pepper, you know how it is if it got to your eyes. They’ll tell you to put it in your vagina. Even if you’re menstruating you’ll still go out to work,” Beatrice said.
The United Nations says women represent more than half of the thousands smuggled from Africa into Europe every year.
Nigerian men are also victims of human trafficking and forced labor.
Forty-five-year-old Chukwuemeka Asiegbu spent six years in Libya and narrowly escaped alive. Upon his return to Nigeria, he started an advocacy group for the rights of trafficked victims.
“As a human trafficker you are meeting needs … your own needs. Is it detrimental to others? And actually we find out that human trafficking is quite detrimental, it’s an epidemic, it’s a disaster because you are meeting needs at the expense of the lives of others,” Asiegbu said.
Thanks to NAPTIP, victims like Beatrice are starting over after being trained in various vocations. Beatrice now runs her own food cafe back home.
Nigeria’s anti-human trafficking agency, NAPTIP was set up in 2003 to address the problem.
Over the years, it has made some progress repatriating and resettling victims back home, says Arinze Orakwe, a director at NAPTIP.
Kenya is increasingly having to deal with smugglers trafficking persons from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somali and Congo to South Africa and beyond. It has become a key transit point with children unfortunately ending up as victims. Trafficking is now a global problem, that needs worldwide solutions.