78 girls trafficked for sex slavery return from Côte d’Ivoire

Seventy-eight of the 150 young Nigerian women trafficked to Cote dIvoire for s#x slavery were safely returned to the country in the early hours of Sunday, May 11. Recall that in April, social critic, Martins Vincent Otse aka Very Dark Man raised alarm about the conditions of the trafficked girls. Thankfully, they returned home aboard Air Peace flight was scheduled for 3:30 pm on Saturday, but that didnt happen until past 11 pm following some diplomatic issues with the Ivorian authorities in Abidjan. Those who returned comprised 75 females between the ages of 13 and 30, three babies, and two adult males, with the majority of them looking malnourished and battered, indicative of the horror they had been through. Four of the returnees, including those under 14 years, were pregnant, just as Air Peace pledged to foot the medical bills of all 150 victims at the Duchess Hospital in Ikeja. On the ground to receive the victims were the Director General, National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), Binta Adamu Bello; the Chief Executive of Air Peace, Allen Onyema; Social media activist, Martins Otse alias VeryDarkMan; the President of the Nigerian Community in Cote DIvoire, Michael Emeka Onwuchekwa and representatives from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Regina Ocheni. Speaking to newsmen upon their return, NAPTIPs DG said all available means and strategies would be deployed to ensure the arrest and prosecution of those behind the atrocious crime. She mentioned that two of the major masterminds had been apprehended in a mansion in Abuja with two victims rescued from them, adding that the agency was already working with relevant partners to arrest others involved in the crime.   Also speaking to newsmen, the President of the Nigerian Community in Ivory Coast, Michael Emeka Onwuchekwa, said many Nigerian girls have been buried in that country after dying in the hands of their traffickers.  He appealed to the federal government to take steps to prevent the trafficking of minors to gold mining countries in West Africa, listing Cote dIvoire, Mali, Burkina Faso and Ghana as the hotbeds. He revealed that there was a camp in Cte dIvoire where there were more than 200 Nigerian girls, especially minors trafficked for prostitution, adding that they were mistakenly sold to farmers mining gold, and it was usually a herculean task to rescue them from those farmers. Onwuchekwa said since his election as President of the union, over 1,550 young girls have been rescued and returned home, emphasising the need for NAPTIP to debrief the victims calmly to get vital information that would assist them in preventing the trafficking of more minors.  I have sent this message to the appropriate authority that Nigerians, mostly minors, are trapped in the Cte dIvoire forest where they were trafficked. They are in the forest where they are mining gold. The federal government of Nigeria needs to pay serious attention because some of these girls die there. We know how many Nigerian girls we have buried over there because no one wanted to locate their families. Some of them also die in the process through the farmers. They are being married/sold to farmers over there, and there is nothing you can do to get them out. I want the government to pay serious attention to this menace facing our young girls. When you look at them, you see that most of them were lied to I just want the government, especially NAPTIP, to come to the level of these young girls, investigate properly to know how the criminals operate. They need to know how those trafficking these girls to Cote dIvoire, Mali, Burkina Faso and Ghana are operating. These are the areas where you will see young Nigerian girls in thousands. There is a camp where you will get over 200 Nigerian girls, and a greater number of them are minors. We rescued over 150 girls, but we were overpowered by hoodlums in the ghetto to release some of these girls. It was the Rapid Response Team of the Nigerian Community in Cte dIvoire that moved in to rescue these girls from where they were.  To get some of them, the team had to go like 50kms to 100kms kilometres into the bush on motorcycles he said.   Some of the victims relived how they were forced to sleep with multiple men and remit the proceeds to their masters, while others who refused were beaten with nails-infested planks. Some of them alleged they were also introduced to drugs, as cheap substances were sold all around them.  One of the victims (name withheld) said she may not be able to recover from the trauma experienced as a result of the exploitation she faced in the French countryside.  I thank God that I am alive today. I saw hell in Abidjan, and I may not be able to forget the suffering and pain I went through forever. Human life is worth nothing in the hands of those madams over there. I thank the Director General of NAPTIP, who personally came to the airport to receive us.She spoke and encouraged us. Since that time she spoke to us inside the aircraft before we came out, my spirit is happy again. I thank the Owner of Air Peace also. May God continue to bless them all, she said. A 14-year-old victim identified as Love said she spent one year in the French countryside, adding that she was told she would go and do domestic servitude. According to her, it took them over a week by road to arrive Ivory Coast, adding that she was with her friend, Abo. She said the dehumanising treatments were meted out by their Nigerian bosses, who, instead of giving them the jobs they were promised, forced them into prostitution and would beat anyone who refused into submission. They took us to a place that was even better than our village. It was a bush area, and they collected our phones and said we had to start doing prostitution. My patron said we should look around, we will see other lifelong guests and cheap drugs. That we should get to work. That was how my suffering started. I refused. I said I will not do it. Because that was not what we were meant to do. She said she does not care what her sister told me before I came to meet her in Ivory Coast. That since I have come, I will do what she wants me to do. I said okay. Each night, they will ask us to dress half-naked and go and look for men who will sleep with us and give us money. I will be running up and down, hiding from one spot to another. At the end of the day, when the market closes, she will be calling them. Each of the patrons will call her girls. How much do you work today? Everybody will give an account, and they will write in the books. When it got to my turn, I told her, Ma, I did not work today. She slapped me and three other girls who did not bring money to her mercilessly. She said since I am an obstacle, she will bring a special thing for me, and she did it. She brought planks filled with nails. Anyone who did not work received a beating from that plank. That is what she has been doing to scare us into doing what she wants. She beat me brutally. She pulled my leg from the root, and I was bleeding. She said I must give her money. The other girls with me got scared and started doing prostitution to give her money. But I met a Yoruba girl who rescued me from her.Watch a video of them below     View this post on Instagram           A post shared by Lindaikejiblog (@lindaikejiblogofficial) The post 78 girls trafficked for sex slavery return from Cte dIvoire appeared first on Linda Ikeji Blog.