Trafficking in Persons: Heavy-duty clampdown now needed
The vibrating quest for greener pastures has brought more Nigerians to the point of desperation to pay any cost possible to effect their desires. No good appeal from the prevailing situations in the Country. The plight of many before the worsening living conditions borne by the premise of the wobbling economy may not be helping circumstances as more Nigerians in their bid to seek better conditions for life are continually doing all that is possible to flee the Country. Even when it means going beyond reasonable norms, it has become close that more citizens in this quest have been found going beyond the normal to see their desires of leaving the Country come true. As social dynamics would be noted to take the course of place, it has become worrisome that some, who have seen the sight of the orientation, have begun to take chance of the situation. Those taking chance of the situation are now known to be exploiting the desperation of persons firmly wishing to flee the Country to their own selfish advantage. As cases would have it, an illicit estate of what is now grounded as human trafficking in the Country has been built around the situation to form a phenomenon of note.
Increasing cases of how this illicit estate is taking extensive network has become disturbing. This is largely troublesome when thought is given to the terms and conditions which the victims of this estate are subjected to. As observed, such terms have been found to be structured on stiffening contractual engagements. Narratives of the inhumane conditions of service which govern the abysmal contract have left sour accounts leaving the victims with negative experiences. The emotional and psychological trauma would not seem to be of permissible appeal. The alarm has brought forth the necessity to combat the illicit estate.
On Tuesday, the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking In Persons (NAPTIP) disclosed the rescue of 61 victims of human trafficking in Kongolom International border Post, Maiadua in Katsina state. The Zonal Commander of NAPTIP in Kano, Abdullahi Babale, who made this known in an interview in Kano on Tuesday, said that the rescue operation was conducted by Officers and men of the Joint Border Task Force collaborating with the Nigeria Immigration Service in Katsina. “The victims were rescued by the Nigeriene Police in the Niger Republic, on their way to Libya. The victims were made up of 29 males and 32 females, aged between 19 and 50. These victims hail from Edo, Imo, Ogun, Osun, Oyo, Ondo and Lagos state. Others are Cross Rivers, Delta, Kano, Kwara, Benue, Akwa Ibom, Ebonyi, Kogi and Gombe state,” he was quoted.
On Monday, 31st January, 2022, it was disclosed that a joint operation of the NAPTIP, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Nigeria High Commission in New Delhi, India, the New Delhi Police and activists from the New Delhi-based Anti-Human Trafficking Organisation (Vihaan-WMS) led to the arrest of a notorious human trafficker, named Joy Okah. A statement signed by NAPTIP’s spokesperson, Adekoye Vincent, on Monday 31st January, 2022, titled ‘Transnational human trafficking syndicates jitter as NAPTIP operatives, New Delhi Police nab another high-profile trafficker in India, rescue three victims’ disclosed the operation also led to the rescue of three Nigerian victims of forced prostitution.
Narratives of the details of the operation, given by the Head of the International and Intelligence Cooperation Unit of NAPTIP, Angela Agbayekhai, reads: “On December 12, 2021, NAPTIP received an SOS via email from a 17-year-old Nigerian minor who was deceitfully trafficked from Nigeria for forced prostitution in India. She requested the intervention of NAPTIP for her rescue and that of other Nigerian victims held captive and forced into the sex trade by one Joy Okah, a Nigerian based in India. NAPTIP networked with the Indian based NGO Vihaan-WMS through intelligence sharing, which resulted in the rescue of the three victims and arrest of their trafficker at New Krishna Park near Well Pharmacy Vikaspuri, New Delhi, India. The victims were recruited from Edo, Delta and Rivers States, Nigeria and trafficked to India for sexual exploitation by Joy Okah and her accomplices. One of the victims travelled from Nigeria on September 17, 2021, while the other two arrived in India from Nigeria on December 14, 2021. The victims were subjected to oath rituals in Nigeria before their eventual travel.”
According to Agbayekhai the victims who travelled with questionable Passports and Student Visas were eventually held captive in New Delhi by Okah, who sponsored their trip. Their phones and travel documents were seized, and they were forced into prostitution to pay up a debt of N4.5m each until their rescue on January 6, 2022.
“Joy Okah is currently facing trial in an Indian Court since January 7, 2022, after her arrest and the victims who are currently in a safe house linked to Vihaan-WMS and assisting the authorities in this regard,” she said. Commenting on the development, Director-General of NAPTIP, Dr Fatima Waziri-Azi, had stated that she has “directed that all persons linked with the recruitment, harbouring, trafficking and sexual exploitation of the three victims who are based in Nigeria, be identified, arrested and prosecuted.”
“We shall take the appropriate legal step to ensure that such proceeds of crime are forfeited and used to assuage the pain inflicted on the victims,” she declared.
Earlier in January, 19th 2022, it was disclosed that a combined team of operatives of NAPTIP and the Department of State Services, Imo State Command, had rescued a middle-aged Burundian woman and her three children suspected to be victims of human trafficking. A statement by NAPTIP’s spokesman, Adekoye Vincent, mentioned that the woman, Siniremera Bizimana, and her three children, Murwaneza Maecy, Akimana Bethel and Umwiza Collins, were freed in the early hours of Wednesday January, 19th 2022, after a sting operation on their holding mud house in Umunoha, Mbaitoli Local Government Area of Imo State. Investigations revealed that the victims were rescued after a complaint from the United Nations High Commission for Refugees was lodged at the NAPTIP’s headquarters and further directive from the Director-General of the agency, Dr Fatima Waziri-Azi. NAPTIP stated that the victims, who had refugee status in Kenya, were trafficked to Lagos by a yet-to-be-identified human trafficker in September 2021, after which they were moved to Umunoha, Imo State, where they were restricted and forced into daily menial labour to feed. Their travel documents and other belongings were also confiscated. The Commander of NAPTIP, Imo State, Earnest Ogbu, stated that accounts from the victims indicated that the trafficker deceived them into coming to Nigeria and a remote village in Imo.
In a related development, NAPTIP, Benue State Zonal Command, had same date, reunited 32 victims of human trafficking with their families. The victims were intercepted by the police on January 5 while being trafficked to Osun State. The Zonal Commander, Mrs Gloria Bai, had disclosed to journalists that most of the 32 victims were underage children. According to her, they were reunited with their families after they were taken home in two buses accompanied by NAPTIP officials and staff of Ukum Local Government Area. The Coordinator had said the suspect, Angbiandoo Akaasema, and the 32 children, were all from the Ukum LGA of the state and were en route to Osun State when they were intercepted. The NAPTIP commander, who noted that some of the children were taken at the age of 10 and others below 18 years, had pointed out that it was against the law to engage any child below the age of 18 as a house help. “Three of the children are from the same parents and from what we heard, they were ready to give out all their children even when they did not know where they were headed,” she had said.
The need to embark on broad sensitisation campaign against the evil of human trafficking has become essential, among other strategic responses to tackle the growing illegal estate. Strategic measures to fortify inter-agency approaches such as that which led to the arrest of, Joy Okah, the kingpin suspects and the rescue of some victims in India, is essential. This is highly recommended to track and dislodge the operating networks of human traffickers. Building stronger coordination of strategies with interfacing connectivity among relevant agencies within Nigeria and those of foreign countries were Nigerians are being starched into, against what they bargained for, is paramount.
Trapping less privileged Nigerians who are innocently looking for better living conditions under stiffer siege of inhumane conditions by exploiting their desperation is despicable, particularly on terms they would not have bargained for, were it made known to them what conditions they are going to be subjected to. Such act is reprehensible and condemnable. It therefore behooves all relevant agencies to intensify efforts to clamping down on the networks of the illicit estate.
The role of all gate-keeping institutions to raise alarm with importunity on the sharp practice becomes important. This is pertinent to enlighten more Nigerians on the dangers that lie before them when they resort to unauthorised means of seeking greener pastures abroad. Hence, coordinating awareness efforts with operational clampdown on the illegal estate should be synchronised in harmonised blend of structural formations. All relevant stakeholders from government to non-governmental bodies, local, subnational and international institutions have roles to play in the fight for humanity.
