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Tag: trafficking

  • ILO launches project to reduce female trafficking

    ILO launches project to reduce female trafficking

    The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has launched a new project called ‘Work in Freedom’ to provide women migrant workers from South Asia with a more secure future.

    The project is funded by the United Kingdom (UK) Department for International Development for 9.75 million pounds over five years.

    The ILO said the initiative focused on domestic workers and garment workers, while Industrial Global Union is a partner in the project.

    “The aim is to provide the women and girls with practical support and advice to enable them to avoid the pitfalls of trafficking and to contribute to a better lifestyle for their families”, said ILO.

    At the meeting in London, the global body said some success stories were applauded, such as the Nepali Trade Union Centre, which has set up support committees for Nepali migrant workers in the most important receiving countries, SEWA, the Indian self-employed women’s association which has successfully organised informal women workers and the Jordanian textile union which also organises migrant workers.

    The ILO Better Work programme focuses on garment workers. In Jordan 40,000 people work in the garment sector, 30,000 of whom are migrant workers. 65 per cent of the workers are women.

    The ILO stated further: “The issues where the Better Work program has made a difference are in stopping the confiscation of documents, the elimination of the nightly curfew, limiting compulsory overtime and changing the recruitment process.

     

     

    “Recently, a collective agreement was signed in Jordan, which can be considered to be an achievement for the region. The contract regulates wages, working hours, union representation and dues check-off, while giving the union the opportunity and the responsibility to represent migrant workers.

    “This contract goes a long way toward ensuring migrant workers’ rights. In Jordan migrant workers have two to three year contracts, whereas Jordanian workers have open-ended contracts. The minimum wage in Jordan is 185 USD per month plus food and accommodation, thus attractive conditions for workers from Bangladesh”.

    The global Labour body harped that precarious work aids and abets trafficking.

    The body charged that in the meantime industry and consumers are required more than ever to abide by ethical manufacturing principles, as such could mean hope for the women who migrate to the Middle East looking for a better life.

  • Curbing drug abuse and trafficking

    June 26 is the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. Established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1987, this day serves as a reminder of the goals agreed to by Member States of creating an international society free of drug abuse. It aims to raise awareness of the major problems that illicit drugs present to society and at the same time, remind youths and adults not to make the mistake of experimenting with drugs.

    World Health Organization defined substance abuse as “the harmful or hazardous use of psychoactive substances, including alcohol and illicit drugs”. It is estimated that about 76.3 million people struggle with alcohol use disorders contributing to 1.8 million deaths per year. The United Nations reported that around 185 million people globally over the age of 15 were consuming drugs by the end of the 20th century.

    Drug abuse (addiction) involves compulsively seeking to use a substance, regardless of the potentially negative social, psychological and physical consequences. Certain drugs, such as narcotics and cocaine, are more physically addicting than some other drugs.

    One has control over the choice to start using drugs, but once addicted, the pleasurable effect of drugs makes one want to keep using them. There are lots of reasons why people take illegal drugs. Some use drugs to escape their problems while others are bored, curious or just want to feel good. People may be pressured into taking drugs to “fit in” with a particular crowd or they may take drugs to rebel or get attention.

    An addiction is not just measured by how many times a person use a drug. Some drugs are so addictive that they may only be used once or twice before the user loses control. A person crosses the line between abuse and addiction when he is no longer trying the drug to have fun but because he has come to depend on it.

    People can become addicted to illegal drugs as well as drugs prescribed by doctors. When prescription drugs are taken the right way, they are safe and there is usually little chance of addiction. However, prescription drugs can be dangerous if they are abused (for example, taking too much or taking them when they are not needed). Mothers and guardians most often administer drugs on their children without going to health providers. This is also drug abuse. Some of the most commonly abused prescription drugs are painkillers and anti-anxiety drugs.

    The more worrisome drugs being abused in our environment is marijuana, cocaine and alcohol. The drug abusers are mostly youth. This should be a source of concern to every one of us. While casual use of marijuana exists among the affluence, it is more common among school drop-outs, homeless and unemployed and unemployable that is acutely sensitive to all sort of criminal behaviours.

    The criminal activities of the drug users at their hide-outs (which are not hidden anyway) are now becoming too frequent for comfort. There are those who operate like cults, carving out their territories of influence where they intimidate, rape and rob innocent residents at will. Residents of areas such as Abisogun Leigh Street in Ogba, Queens drive (formerly Oyinkan Abayomi), Victoria Island, Adura field in Alagbado and ‘Kuwait’ located inside Gowon Estate in Egbeda know better of their harrowing experience from this group. There was a particular incidence I witnessed earlier this year when a whole street had to close its entrance doors when there was a fight by the omo amugbos where guns were used around 8:00 am in the morning. Some, including children fell into gutters while scrambling for safety.

    Next, are forceful beggars who illegally obtain toll from motorists at alternate roads when there is traffic on the highways. There are also those who operate on the streets that one must obtain ‘clearance’ from when one buys a new car. If much was not achieved from ‘street begging’, some do enter into mosques and churches to go and beg for money. Their tales usually range from having their wives critically ill at the hospitals, challenge to offset house rent or in need of money to eat.

    It is important to illustrate what drugs such as marijuana do to the body and minds of the users. The smoke of marijuana is toxic. It can lead to serious disorders, including cancer. The negative effects also include confusion, acute panic reactions, anxiety attacks, fear and loss of self-control. Chronic marijuana users may develop a motivational syndrome characterized by passivity, decreased motivation, and preoccupation with taking drugs. Like alcoholic intoxication, marijuana intoxication impairs judgment, comprehension, memory, speech, problem-solving abilities. Of particular worry is the permanence of its ill-effect among people who began smoking in adolescence. Aside the smokers, every one of us, as passive smoker is a potential victim of some of the ill-effects. Yet, there is hardly any area in Nigeria free of this drug problem and the subsequent criminal behaviour of its users.

    No doubt, when you give people foothold, they take a strong hold. As such the gory tale of open use of marijuana is an indictment on the part of our security operatives especially the anti-narcotic agency. The federal controlled security agency legalized this illegal drug through their own illegal act of extorting money from traders. Some of them are also criminals in uniform who smoke at same spots where criminal activities are planned and executed by hoodlums. The traditional standards and values that place additional responsibility on holder of public offices in sane society are almost nil here in Nigeria.

    The police, in particular, will in the years to come have much more to do if the trend of crime and behaviour that aids drug is not given attention it deserves now. Plainly put, our anti-drug war is still cosmetic in approach. We will be fooling ourselves if we believe we are tackling the situation by merely sensitizing motor-parks and running jingles in the media without effectively starting the war from the production and distribution outlets. Treatment of cause should be more important than its symptoms.

    In sum, anti-narcotic agency must step up the clampdown on the production, control of the sale, distribution and use of illicit drugs. Agencies of government saddled with national orientation and those with responsibility of curbing crimes must be up and doing. In this regard, Lagos State Government establishment of Drug-Free Club and plan to include drug abuse in its school curriculum is seen as right on-spot.

    As we celebrate this year’s International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking globally, the lesson for us all to learn is that breaking addiction to drug is the only way to get off the hook. It may not be easy to quit. But the efforts will be rewarded by better health, better relationships with the people in one’s life and a sense of accomplishment that only living drug-free can give. Make health your “new high” not drugs.

     

    •Musbau is of the Features Unit of Lagos State Ministry of Information and Strategy.

     

  • Senate attributes terrorists’ activities, human trafficking to porous borders

    Senate attributes terrorists’ activities, human trafficking to porous borders

    The Senate yesterday blamed increasing rate of terrorists’ activities and human trafficking on the country’s porous borders.

    The upper chamber attributed the high rate of human trafficking in the border communities to the inability of the government to meet the social needs of the residents.

    Senate President David Mark said this when he inaugurated a public hearing on a bill for an Act to amend the Border Communities Development Agency Act Cap B10 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria and for related matters, 2013.

    The bill, sponsored by Senator Olufemi Lanlehin (Oyo South), seeks to strengthen the agency to make it perform its functions.

    The agency has the responsibility of improving the social and economic lives of Nigerians living in settlements, villages and towns spread across 96 local governments in 21 states along Nigeria’s borders.

    The Act, enacted in 2004, was first amended in 2006 to reposition the agency to cope with operational inadequacies.

    Lanlehin said despite the amendment, the condition of the border communities was yet to improve.

    Mark, who was represented by Senator James Manager, noted that the problem has deteriorated, especially with the influx of mercenaries, terrorists and other armed groups through the country’s porous borders.

    The situation in the border communities, he said, is worsened by the fact that the dearth of basic amenities, such as good schools, hospitals, markets and water, make inhabitants of the communities to cross to neighbouring countries to enjoy the amenities.

    He noted that it is the intendment of the amendment bill to provide a very convenient ground to enable the agency function adequately and efficiently, to improve the lives of the residents of the border communities and tighten security.

    Mark hailed the sponsor of the bill and the Senate “for giving voice to the needy.”

    Lanlehin noted that Nigerians in the border communities, who had suffered prolonged and systematic neglect and continued deprivations in the hands of successive governments, heaved a sigh of relief when the pioneer Governing Board of the Border Communities Development Agency was inaugurated in December 2009.

    The expectation, he said, was that the agency would champion and address the need for infrastructural development in the border communities.

    The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) lawmaker noted that the affected communities lacked social amenities that could qualify them as human settlements in the 21st century.

    He said: “The inhabitants travel by feet on narrow trails, which often involves crossing rivers – small and large- and such risky crossings result in loss of human lives and those of livestock, particularly in the rainy season.

    “Schools, basic health facilities, potable water and electricity are either non- existent or grossly inadequate, making their lives miserable in this supposedly wealthy country of ours.

    “Regrettably, a decade after the Border Communities Development Act was passed and signed into law and almost four years after the pioneer Governing Board of the agency was inaugurated, the condition of our people in the border communities has not improved as envisaged, due partly to poor funding of the agency.”

    Senator Lanlehin said the funds allocated to the agency were insufficient to meet the needs and aspirations of Nigerians in the border communities “and are getting smaller each year, culminating in the paltry sum of N436million for 2013.”

     

     

     

  • Human trafficking: Nigerian girls sold into sex slavery in Italy

    Naples mafiosi were convicted last week of forcing a Nigerian cancer patient into prostitution. Barbie Latza Nadeau on the African girls trapped in Italy’s sex-slave trade.

    The Domitiana highway was built in 95 A.D. as a thoroughfare, leading north up the boot of Italy from the bay of Naples. Now it is something like a one-stop sex supermarket where up to 600 Nigerian prostitutes can be found at a time along a 30-kilometer stretch of the pot-holed road.

    Across Italy, Nigerian women are forced into the sex trade, essentially kept as slaves who are bought and sold and moved according to a moribund supply and demand. Some of the prostitutes are young girls, just 13 or 14 years old. Others are in their 20s or 30s. Many have children. Some are still married to men in Nigeria. They usually sit on white plastic chairs under umbrellas to protect them from the rain in the winter and the harsh sun in the summer. The highest concentration of Nigerian forced sex workers is in and around Naples, but they are not limited to the southern reaches. On Thursday, in the central region of Abruzzo, four Nigerian gang members and an Italian taxi driver who allegedly procured prostitutes across the country were sentenced to between nine and 15 years in prison for making 23-year-old Nigerian Lilian Solomon prostitute herself even though she was in the late stages of lymphoma cancer. The court in Teramo ruled that the Nigerian band prohibited the young woman from seeking treatment and should be held responsible for her death. She was represented in court by members of “On the Road” association against sex trafficking, which alerted authorities about her plight. Solomon testified under oath against the band before she died in 2009. The sentence, four years after her death, won’t bring her back, but it is one small step toward holding the sex traffickers accountable.

    According to Renato Natale, a local Neapolitan doctor who is a former anti-mafia mayor of Casal di Principe, the majority of the Nigerian girls and women who are sex slaves were sold for around $50,000 by their parents or husbands in Nigeria, often to pay loan sharks or to get families out of debt. Some women paid sums of more than $13,000 out of their own pockets in exchange for the promise to find legitimate work in Italy with the goal of sending money home or even eventually bringing their entire families over. Natale says when they arrive in Italy, they are often raped into submission and plied with drugs and turned into prostitutes. Many of the women have scars on their bodies from a voodoo-style initiation ritual where they pledge allegiance to their pimps out of fear of torture. “Frida,” 26, is a former prostitute who now works at a shelter for abused women in Rome. She says her initiation included vaginal penetration with a hot candle. She has scars on her inner thighs from the hot wax. She worked on the Via Domitiana for three years before she ran away with one of her clients who she befriended. She said many of the women on the Neapolitan highway try to convince the clients to take them away, but they often get caught and the men are threatened never to return. “Even the police sometimes pay for sex,” she told The Daily Beast. “There is no protection there from anyone. There is no one you can trust.”

    She says she was required to pay the Nigerian mafia dons $400 a month for one-square-meter of highway to work off the $50,000 investment. Natale says the Nigerians, in turn, pay a fee to the Casalesi clan of the Camorra organized-crime syndicate, who run the sex trade around Naples. Natale says the women are not allowed to charge more than $13 a trick—the market rate for street sex in the impoverished south—and they are not allowed to refuse customers. Frida says they were afraid to charge more. “They watched us all the time,” she says. “They would drive by or send spies to make sure we stayed in line.”

    Prostitution is not illegal in Italy as long as the sex workers are over 18, but it is illegal to pick up a prostitute on the street. Recently, police have been enforcing the client crackdown on roadside prostitution by fining the clients, so the mob has started buying up apartment blocks along the Via Domitiana and in other parts of the country. They have started moving the women off the streets and into the villas where drugs are sold in the basement and sex is sold upstairs. Natale used to visit the women on the streets and give them medications for STDs. He says the move to put the women in the houses is far more dangerous and life-threatening. “These people are treated like merchandise,” he says. “Now they are being kept in these houses that are protected by armed guards. They were somewhat safer on the streets because at least there we could check on them.”

    There is little hope to stop the illegal sex-trafficking racket, says Natale, because most of the women are illegal immigrants and do not have documents and are not in the Italian state system and therefore “nonexistent” in the eyes of the authorities. But there is also a bigger problem in that there is no authoritative government entity currently involved in stopping sex trafficking in Italy. All the work is done by non-governmental organizations with limited funds and virtually no power. “We are like ghosts,” says Frida, who recently legalized her living status in Italy and wants to help other Nigerians get off the street. “We are literally shadows on the highway.”

    • Source: The Daily Beast

     

  • Nigerian jailed for trafficking teenagers across Europe

    Nigerian jailed for trafficking teenagers across Europe

    A man has been jailed for 14 years for his role in the”horrific” ordeal of two teenage girls being trafficked via London to work as prostitutes in mainland Europe.

    A court heard Odosa Usiobaifo, 35, from Enfield, north London, was involved in a “significant” organised crime gang trafficking young women for the purposes of sexual exploitation.

    Usiobaifo was arrested after two Nigerian girls missing from local authority care in London were given false passports and tickets and placed on a flight to Spain.

    The 35-year-old, who had collected the girls from a pre-arranged meeting point before they were given the false documents and put on the flight, was found guilty of conspiring to traffick for the purposes of sexual exploitation following a four-week trial at Isleworth Crown Court.

    He had pleaded guilty to conspiring to facilitate illegal immigration earlier in the trial.

    The court heard the girls, aged 14 and 15 at the time, had previously been stopped by Border Force officers at Heathrow Airport separately on September 17 and November 23, 2011.

    Both were using false passports which indicated they were adults.

    They had arrived on flights from Lagos, Nigeria, and were attempting to travel on to Paris, the trial heard.

    During interviews with the Serious Organised Crime Agency’s Vulnerable Persons Team it became clear that the pair were being trafficked to mainland Europe, via London, for the purposes of sexual exploitation.

    They were placed in local authority care but on April 6, 2012 were reported missing to Sussex Police by their respective foster carers.

    Investigations revealed that contact had been made with the girls and Usiobaifo had collected them from a pre-arranged meeting point before they were given false passports and tickets and placed on a flight to Spain.

    One of the girls was refused entry to Spain and returned to the United Kingdom, where she remains in the care of the UK authorities. The other passed through Spanish border controls and is still missing.

    Usiobaifo was arrested at his flat in Enfield on September 3, 2012 alongside his partner Katie Igha, 25.

    Last Thursday a jury found Usiobaifo guilty of all charges but acquitted Igha of trafficking. They failed to reach a verdict on a charge of conspiring to facilitate against Igha.

     

  • How will the fight against human trafficking fare this year?

    How will the fight against human trafficking fare this year?

    From all indications, the National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons and Other Related Matters (NAPTIP) has been striving to strengthen its operational strategies since a drop in Nigeria’s rating in the global anti-human trafficking campaign. The 2012 annual trafficking report, which was released in the United States (U.S.), indicated that Nigeria dropped to the tier two ranking. Nigeria had been maintaining a tier one status since 2007.

    According to the U.S. Department of State, the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report is the U.S. Government’s principal diplomatic tool to engage foreign governments in the global anti-human trafficking campaign. The report places each country into one of three tiers, based on the extent of their governments’ efforts to comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking, which are enshrined in Section 108 of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA).

    Mrs. Hillary Clinton, the U.S. Secretary of State, in her statement during the release of the report, noted that as many as 27 million people around the world were victims of modern-day slavery. “We sometimes call trafficking in persons. Those victims of modern slavery are women and men, girls and boys, and their stories remind us of the kind of inhumane treatment we are capable of perpetrating as human beings,” she said.

    The drop in Nigeria rating in the U.S. report somewhat indicated that Nigeria had not fully complied with the minimum standards set out in the TVPA but was making significant efforts to comply with them.

    The Executive Secretary of NAPTIP, Mrs Beatrice Jedy-Agba, however, underscored the commitment of the agency to checking the menace of human trafficking.

    She said: “The U.S. government has adopted the ‘whole of society’ approach in this assessment, which automatically removes the outcome from the reins of the agency, as the indices used are not entirely within the control of NAPTIP. “However, it is a clarion call on all tiers of government to close ranks and step up actions to rid the country of the scourge of human trafficking.’’

    Mrs. Jedy-Agba said the agency was developing a five-year strategic plan to ensure effective response to emerging trends in the human trade, while strengthening the agency’s coordination capacity and functions. She said that the main thrust of the plan was to improve synergy between all the stakeholders and partners involved in the anti-human trafficking crusade.

    “The traffickers usually make false promises of a better life abroad and earning money in dollars. Eventually, these girls end up becoming prostitutes to pay their so-called ‘sponsors’ who took them there,’’ she said.

    The NAPTIP boss said many Nigerian girls were hood-winked into partaking in the booming sex trade in Cote d’Ivoire and Burkina Faso, adding that the agency would use its available resources to bring the hapless girls home for rehabilitation. Mrs. Jedy-Agba said that unemployment and poverty were the major factors responsible for human trafficking, adding that if these factors were tackled decisively, people would no longer be deceived and ensnared in the human trafficking web.

    “The three tiers of government must take a holistic and coordinated approach to address factors such as poverty, unemployment, collapse of family values and erosion of our cultural values,” Mrs. Jedy-Agba said.

    Mr Arinze Orakwue, the Head, Communications and Media, in NAPTIP, said that the agency would continue its advocacy with state governments on the need to fight human trafficking and implement the Child Rights Act.

    “NAPTIP is fully committed to cooperating with the police, the immigration service and other law enforcement agencies in the fight against human trafficking,” he said.

    Orakwue emphasised that a lot of public awareness was being created through radio jingles to sensitise the citizens to the evils of human trafficking. He also said that NAPTIP, in collaboration with the Wale Adenuga Productions, had started a television drama series, depicting issues of human trafficking, child abuse and other related concerns.

    “The objective is to take the anti-trafficking campaign to the living rooms of Nigerians, and hopefully make them aware of this crime that shames us all,’’ he added. NAPTIP is also collaborating with the European Union Delegation, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Nigeria Immigration Services (NIS) in the anti-human trafficking crusade.

    For instance, its “I Am Priceless” campaign against trafficking in persons and smuggling of mgrants was launched in Abuja on October 9, 2012. The nationwide campaign, funded by the European Union (EU), was designed to reduce irregular migration that “occurs through trafficking in persons and smuggling of migrants.’’ Two “National Goodwill Ambassadors’’ — Ms Joke Silva, a renowned actress, and a “hip-hop’ musician, Mr Jude Abaga — were appointed to boost the public awareness campaign on human trafficking issues. Ms Angele Dikongue-Atangana, the Country Representative of UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), who appointed the two “ambassadors’’, said that they would use their artistic channels – music and film — to amplify the advocacy and public sensitisation efforts.

  • NAPTIP enlists ambassadors against human trafficking

    NAPTIP enlists ambassadors against human trafficking

    The National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons and Other Related Matters (NAPTIP) has enlisted people to be its ambassadors against trafficking in humans.

    Those enlisted included reporters, officials of NGOs, Nigerian Prison Service, Nigeria Immigration Service and state government establishments.

    The agency said those enlisted were to take the campaigns against human trafficking to rural communities and decry such crime against humanity.

    The ambassadors were enlisted at the opening of an anti-human trafficking community dialogue held in Benin City, the Edo State capital.

    The Executive Secretary of NAPTIP, Mrs. Beatrice Jedy-Agba, who spoke at the event, urged the ambassadors to help sustain NAPTIP’s commitment to checkmating the assault on human dignity.

    A cleric, Bishop Atoe Iyobosa, said he had apprehended three pastors for selling pants to prostitutes with a view to preventing them from contracting HIV/AIDS.

    Bishop Iyobosa said he was embarrassed when he saw Nigerian girls engaging in prostitution abroad.

    The National Coordinator of the Child Protection Network, Mrs. Jennifer Ero, narrated how a native doctor defiled a 10-year-old girl with the consent of her father.

     

     

  • IPMAN executive jailed in Saudi for drug trafficking

    AUTHORITIES of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia have sentenced a Nigerian and executive member of the Kwara State Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) to six months in prison for cocaine trafficking.

    The embattled petroleum marketer (name withheld) went on lesser hajj last August with his wife en route Kano.

    He allegedly hid the suspected substance inside the yam flour neatly packaged in his travelling bag.

    But Saudi security officials allegedly fished out the substance from where it was stuck.

    When interrogated by security personnel, the IPMAN executive was said to have owned up while his wife was instantly set free.

    He was said to have been convicted immediately according to Saudi laws.

    It was gathered the development automatically prevented him from performing the lesser hajj.

    Friends and relations could not ascertain his whereabouts until the wife was said to have contacted them on the development.

    It was also gathered authorities of the Saudi Arabia government had communicated the decision to the leadership of IPMAN in Kwara state.

    Not a few members of the association have expressed dismay over the development, describing it as unfortunate.

    A member of the state executive of IPMAN, who craved anonymity, confirmed the development.

    He said zonal and national offices of IPMAN had taken steps to fill the vacant seat.

    A member of the executives said it is morally wrong for the association to allow an ex-convict to return to office.

    The source said, “the move for his replacement would serve as a lesson to the people, particularly the members.”

    It was gathered he had commenced serving the jail term, which ends in December, since August.

  • Another view on child trafficking law

    Another view on child trafficking law

    SIR: In those days many indigent children, including orphans and those whose parents were too poor to cater for them, rose to eminent positions, such as judges, professors, engineers, medical doctors, successful business men and women, etc., through being houseboys and housemaids. Now the law of Nigeria criminalises as “child-traffickers” those who help to find such jobs. Yet, there is no adequate welfare package for indigent parents and children.

    There are two alternative reasonable courses of action. Either the government abrogates the law forbidding houseboy-ship and housemaid-ship or adopts indigent children who are caught “trafficked” and train or educate them up to the point they can fend for themselves. Yes, some parents may plot “child trafficking” to get the government to adopt their children, but why should the government be unmindful of the implications of its laws?

    Why should Nigerian rulers be unrealistic in their laws? It is because they are pretending to love the people more than the people love themselves. Remember one state government forbids pregnant women to board a motorcycle. The government could not think of any state of emergency that might warrant that a pregnant woman boards a motorcycle.

    I don’t know any country in the world where there are no families or individuals who need house-helps and could afford to pay for them. Take the case in which both the husband and the wife are extremely busy, and the children are not old enough or have all left home as self-supporting adults. What is wrong if they get a house-help and help him or her to become somebody in life one way or another? Human beings are basically selfish or egocentric, but not all of them are equally so. Many “child traffickers” care about the goodness or badness of those for whom they get house-helps, and they also instruct the house-helps to be of good behaviour.

    Why do people overlook the complexities of human life and paint things as either good or bad, when they have the potentiality to be good or bad, depending on circumstances and how you handle them? That is the case with motor-cycling and “child-trafficking” as well. By providing good security operation and traffic wardens, you will have minimal problem with motor-cycling, and the citizens will enjoy its services with self-satisfaction. By providing appropriate regulations, needy families and individuals will get house-helps, and both parties will get satisfaction or face the wrath of the law, as the case may be. Many Nigerian rulers are guilty of egocentricism and anti-people tendencies, while pretending to love poor people.

     

    • Pius Oyeniran Abioje, Ph. D,

    University of Ilorin.

  • Woman, 65, held for cocaine trafficking

    The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), yesterday arrested a 65-year-old grandmother, Hassan Fatimat Abike also known as Chika Okoye, for allegedly trying to smuggle 1.740Kilogramms of substance suspected to be cocaine on board of British Airways flight to London, in a herbal syrup.

    According to a statement, she was arrested at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos, while attempting to board a British Airways flight by NDLEA, it was not the first time the suspect was travelling to London. The drug, the agency said, was cleverly packed in balloons and inserted in 10 plastic containers of herbal syrup.

    According to the Airport Commander, Mr. Hamza Umar, the suspect has two international passports bearing Hassan Fatimat Abike with passport numbers A03348648 and A3771781A.

    “She was caught during the screening of British Airways passengers to London. The cocaine found in her possession was packed in balloons and prepared into the shape of the plastic bottles. It was also wrapped in black polythene inside 10 plastic bottles of local herbal mixtures. Each bottle was neatly sealed to avoid suspicion,” Hamza said.

    Preliminary investigation, according to Hamza, revealed that she is also known as Chika Okoye. He said: “She speaks Ibo and Yoruba fluently. Her father is a native of Abeokuta, Ogun State while her mother hails from Owerri, Imo State. Hassan Fatimat Abike also known as Chika Okoye, has six children and many grandchildren. She currently lives alone in Owerri and sells clothes to earn a living. The drug found in her bag tested positive for cocaine and weighed 1.740kg.”

    In her statement, the suspect claimed ownership of the drug, saying that it was given to her by a friend. She said: “I live at Owerri alone because my children are grown up and now have their families. I sell clothes to take care of myself. I met an old friend two weeks ago and during our discussion, I told him I will soon be travelling to London.

    “He asked me to deliver some herbal medicine to his sick relative in London. I was only trying to assist an old friend. I blame myself for everything, because I should have turned down his request. The drug was detected during a search at the airport.”

    Chairman, Chief Executive of the NDLEA, Ahmadu Giade, said the agency is investigating her claim. “The case is under investigation to ascertain her role. This is very worrisome, considering the fact that she is a grandmother,” Giade stated.