According to the United Nations, human trafficking involves the recruitment, harbouring or transporting people into forced labour, forced prostitution, forced begging, forced criminality, domestic servitude, forced and forced organ removal through exploitation.
Usually the victims are cajoled to believe the promise of a better life in an advanced country by the perpetrators of the heinous crime. In a quest to seek better standards of livings, the victims are lured and coerced into a situation where there is no going back.
Initially, they don’t have the means to afford the better standard living conditions, so they borrow money from the traffickers who deceive and exploit them into life-long slavery.
Human trafficking is a grave crime against the fundamental rights of an individual. It has been present as far back as the days of colonialism. It steals a person’s freedom.
It is a serious crime that involves the exchange of rights to live to prolonged servitude. The victims are usually exploited and forced into slavery or commercial sex by the traffickers or other parties.
Majority of the victims are usually women and girls. This is because they are most vulnerable when it comes to sexual exploitation and domestic work. The men and boys are usually misrepresented. They statistically account for other economic activities associated with human trafficking. However, victims do not necessarily have to be disadvantaged because the major tool is deception.
No community is immune to human trafficking. Victims are likely to suffer from trauma, abuse, disability, violence, family breakdown, homelessness, poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition and other combination factors. Traffickers fall into the category of pretenders, who entice their victims with promise of a better life.
They also serve as providers who meet the needs of their victims. As protectors, they appear to have the best interests of their victims only to lure them to their freedom. They are also punishers.
When the victims fail to meet their part of the bargain, they end up being used. They include men and women everywhere such as relations, neighbours etc.
Even though victims give their consent to the heinous crime, it is still regarded as human trafficking. Mrs. Morenike Omaiboje, Director of Programs, Women Consortium of Nigeria (WOCON), seconded this line of thought.
According to her, there is no degree of consent that can be overlooked as justifiable since victims can never understand the trauma awaiting them.
She further stated that human trafficking is a global menace that all stakeholders must curb to bring offenders under the law. They can do so by seeking knowledge and information on the menace, report suspects, refuse to be gullible to strangers’ promises of better life abroad and rejecting to follow new friends to unknown places. She also admonished the government to show more commitment in bringing justice to victims.
On the role of agencies, she said that they can help fight this societal vice by raising awareness, grassroots campaigns, holding workshops and seminars on human trafficking, creating dialogues, press conferences on the matter and carrying out schools and university based advocacy.
With the trend, fortunately, thousands have been tried and jailed yet many have escaped facing the wrath of the law. This is where agencies like NAPTIP come in because they handle the legal framework ensuring that laws are adequate and enforced.
According to Love Justice International, they have 44 different transit monitoring stations located where human trafficking is present. These include areas near important border crossings or transit hubs in Nepal, Bangladesh, India, Mongolia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Uganda, Kenya, Benin and South Africa. With focus on transit monitoring to rescue people from being exploited, the Love Justice Staff usually interview the suspected trafficker with the slightest clues.
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Through the creation of awareness, Trace Kenya reintegrates victims of human trafficking back into the society. This NGO based in Mombasa, Kenya, was founded to help rescue, rehabilitate and integrate women, youth and children who were victims of human trafficking.
Victims face a lot trauma from their ordeal in the hand of human traffickers. When rescued, they have to go through the process of family tracing then rehabilitation and finally reintegration back into the society.
Most times, the human trafficking takes place across state lines, across international borders and across interest groups and ideological divisions. It can occur within a country e.g. from Onitsha or Ibadan where one lives to Lagos or from Calabar to Port Harcourt. That is an internal human trafficking.
Or it can be transnational through routes in Italy, Spain, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Belgium and some other parts of Europe as well as parts of the Middle East like Oman, Qatar, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and several parts of Africa such as Mali, Ghana etc
Shedding more light on human trafficking relating to migration, Mrs. Morenike Omaboije said that migration is a natural thing. Hence, people can still migrate legally to any part of the world on their own without fear of trafficking.
She further stated that sadly, human trafficking is not viewed that way. It is only when one falls victim by seeking help to migrate from their own base or home country or where they live that they have fallen victim.
Giving examples, she said that migrating to Italy to live there with ones family after applying for a job there legally after qualifying for the application does not make one a victim of human trafficking.
Even though Italy is the height of prostitution, this does not make one a victim if due process is followed. It only becomes human trafficking when deception, transportation and harbouring are involved.
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