Trafficked Children Exposed to “Colonial various”
Eric Adah
Makurdi
Child trafficking is said to be the action or practice of illegally procuring and relocating children, typically for the purpose of forced labour or sexual exploitation.
Children and women are recruited with the promise of well paid jobs in urban centres or with the aim of admitting them to school to acquire western education and a better life within the country or abroad, realizing too late that they have been lured into a debt bond. Violence, coercion and deception are used to take victim away from their families.
In Benue State due to the economic hardship occasioned by lockdown and attendant economic realities, trafficked children are expected to carry the burden of their host families.
12 year old Dooter Kwaghfan, hawker of fruits and vegetables within Makurdi town said she is from Uikpam, Guma Local Government Area of Benue State. Her parents are in the IDP Camp as a result of the Fulani invasion of their settlements. Dooter said the woman she lives with is not even her relation, her uncle who made the arrangements told her she will be sent to school, only for her to end up in the hawking business. She was blatantly told by her madam that profits from her sell will be saved for her education. She decried that even with the lockdown of the state, she is compelled to go out and sell whereas the children of her madam relaxed at home, though two of them are females and older than her.When she reported to her uncle, he rebuked her that where she stays is a “Heaven” compare to where she was.
11 year old Inalegwu Samson from Otukpa, hawker of plantain chips and groundnuts also said there is no lockdown for him. Inalegwu said he is scared of Coronavirus based on what he hears, but while his host family “stays in one place at home, watching movies and eating, I am forced to come out daily to sell chips and groundnuts.” He recounted how he escaped a running vehicle while he was escaping away from lockdown enforcement officers in Wadata.
Another Hawker who simply calls herself Blessing said she is from Adikpo in Benue State and lives with a certain woman known to her father. She too said the lockdown is for her madam and her children, for her the business of selling fried fish continues as the woman says the demand is high because most people cannot go to the markets for fear of “Colonial Various.” Her problem started when her mother separated from her father and married another man. She and her siblings have been distributed to different families in Kaduna, Abuja and Makurdi. None of them has attempted school. The decision to share them out was because their step mother refused living in the same house with them.
The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) told THE TRANSMITTER via telephone interview that it is doing the best it can to stop children trafficking by sensitization through different media platforms using local languages. Although, the agency is handicapped by manpower and logistics to carry out its constitutional mandate, members of the public are urged to contact the nearest NAPTIP office for complaints of child trafficking or abuse.
Governments at the federal and states levels must look into this area as the “stay at home” directives have giving more pressure to trafficked children. These children have carried the burden of hawking to keep up with the demands of their host families, at the detriment of their health occasioned by the faceless Coronavirus.
