Waging War On Human Trafficking

Human trafficking has become a major menace in Ghana and the African continent. In recent past, the miseries and stultifying effects of the cruelties of the slave trade and slavery which Africa suffered from four centuries before their abolition are better forgotten than remembered but for the fact that most unfortunately, the world is currently plagued by modern day forms of the trade and the conditions experienced by persons who fall victim to it.

In order to develop programme of action directed at reducing and eradicating the trafficking and smuggling of persons across national, regional and continental boundaries, some Ghanaians have appreciated the efforts of some Non-Governmental Organizations, various Religious Bodies, the National and Regional House of Chiefs and parents for their efforts to reduce the in humane practices of human trafficking among the people of God.

Ghanaians have a methodology of preferential option for the poor in fostering the achievement of the internal millennium developments goals especially the Rural Development and Education Project (RUDEP) aimed at eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, achievement of universal primary education as well as promoting gender equity and empowerment of women and ensuring environmental sustainability respectively by 2015.

Human Trafficking is defined by the laws of Ghana as 'the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring, trading or receipt of persons within and across borders by the use of force, threats and other forms of coercion, abduction, fraud, deception, the abuse of power, or exploitation of vulnerability.' It is against the law of the land to give or receive payments and benefits to achieve consent. Exploitation of people include at the minimum -induced prostitution and other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or removal of organs.

Human Trafficking according to the UN Protocol seeks to prevent, suppress and punish trafficking in persons especially women and children defined as 'the recruitment, transportation, transfer, habouring or receipt of persons by means of threat or use of force or other forms of coercion or abduction or fraud, deception or abuse of power or of position of vulnerability or of the given or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person for the purpose of exploitation.

Trafficking, so to speak can also be a combination of series of events that occur at the place of origin, transit point and destination and comes in various forms - internal and external trafficking.

Several factors have been indentified to be the prime causes of human trafficking. These factors include: high levels of poverty and desire for better life, harmful cultural practices such as 'Trokosi' and female genital mutilation, low educational levels, high level of school drop-out, high unemployment rates, irresponsible parenting, large household sizes, domestic violence, ignorance, high demand for cheap labour, inadequate border controls, preponderance of unregulated informal economy and unreliable rainfall pattern especially in Northern Ghana.

Some of the negative effects identified by the participants on the victims of human trafficking include; denial of opportunity for proper and balanced development, condemnation of perpetual poverty, lack of education and employable skills, the traumatic suffering of isolation from parents and families and impaired health.

The African Network Against Human Trafficking in collaboration with the Migrants Commission of the National Catholic Secretariat together with the International Movement of Catholic Students wish to commend all stakeholders in the fight against human trafficking most especially successive governments for the introduction and implementation of the Free Compulsory Universal Basic Education (FCUBE) programme, the school feeding programme and the capitation grants for pupils in all basic public schools, the promulgation of the Human Trafficking Act of 2005 and the implementation of the ECOWAS initial plan of Action Against Trafficking persons 2003 - 2000.

In Africa today and in the Christian context human trafficking is not a new thing because we all know the story of how the elder sons of Israel trafficked their younger brother, Joseph by selling him to merchants.

In the recent past, persons in the majority - women and children in modern times, find themselves victims of human trafficking. The canker shows itself in both national and international dimensions. In respect of Ghana, there are internal manifestations, in-state manifestations in the West African sub-region, within the continent and between the continent Europe and the Middle-East.

According to a survey in the US between 600,000 and 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders each year. Many more are trafficked within their own country. About 1.2 million children are also victims of child trafficking.

The two major routes in West Africa, along which children trafficking takes place are the Mali - Burkina Faso - Ivory Coast route and the Togo - Benin - Nigeria - Cameroon route, with Ghana being a strategic transit point between two routes.

Children trafficking, according to Most Rev. Paul Bemile, Bishop of Wa, at the West African Regional workshop on dangers of Human trafficking in Accra, is not motivated only by the need for labour on plantation farms and their use as child soldiers, child trafficking forms part of the global sex trade, which is considered as the worst form of child labour.

He said Human Trafficking Bill should be vigorously enforced at both national and international levels to prosecute prospective traffickers and perpetrators of the inhuman trade.

'Ghanaians and non-Ghanaians, government institutions, non-Governmental organisations and faith-based organisations, must all seek to collaborate with each other in order to eradicate human trafficking not only in Ghana but in the West African sub-region and the world as a whole,' he stated.

The Bible teaches us that every human being deserves to live in dignity. We Christians believe that God sent his only begotten son, Jesus, to suffer and die for us so that we may be redeemed from suffering. It is therefore not normal for some people to go through suffering caused by the greed and selfishness of their fellow human beings, stated Bishop Paul Bemile of Wa, who was once the Episcopal Chairman of Migrants Commission of the Ghana Bishop's Conference.

In Ghana, a Religious Organisations known as 'Collaboration with Women in Distress '(COLWOD) was set up in 1995 to prevent young girls and women in Northern Ghana from falling prey to human trafficking. In 2001, the Committee for the support of Dignity of Women was set up in Nigeria by the Nigerian Conference of Women Religious to combat the same course.

In Africa, the Catholic Bishop's Conferences had waged relentless war against human trafficking through their pastoral letters with respect to their specific local situations. The Justice and Peace Commission of the Union of Superiors Generally started a working Group in 1999 to fight the trafficking of women and children.

On the regional level, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) initiated its fist plan of Action on the fight against illegal trafficking of persons in 2002. Their latest three-year Plan of Action from 2006-2009 aims at protecting and supporting the victims of this infamous trade seeking ways of preventing it by creating awareness, as well as planning strategies for its elimination by the collection of data and the analysis of relevant information.

In July, 2005, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Niger, Mali, Nigeria, Benin and Ghana signed a multilateral agreement on child trafficking in West Africa, while Memorandum of Understanding was signed between governments.

Despite the many efforts by organisations and religious bodies in finding solutions, it is a shame of the activity but the reality is that it is a well networked business operated by people who can be most vicious towards both the victims of human trafficking and the anti-trafficker if he or she is not careful in his noble actions aimed at eliminating or curbing the menace.

On the domestic scene, both adults and children are lured from the rural areas to urban environs with promises of greener pastures, better opportunities of education, only to have the victims visited with difficult, and most times, dehumanizing working and living conditions.

A story is told in one of the dailies in Ghana about the harrowing experience of a bread baker, who stopped her bread-baking business in Ghana with the hope of making more money as a nanny in Russia, only to be lured into prostitution.

The horrifying experience of the bread baker should be a notice that there are demands for persons, sometimes genuine but which is exploited by traffickers. The genuine demand for house helps, laundry persons and various forms of domestic work which require hands are examples which however in some instances are badly abused.

A former Deputy Minister of Women's and Children Affairs of Ghana, Mr. Daniel Dugan at the West African workshop for member organisations of Caritas Internationalis was quoted as saying that 'Even the safety catch net of the extended family system of assisting poorer members of families to cater for their children or to educate them have ended up in situations of exploitations of both boys and girls more especially the girls is a bastardised nature very useful cultural value'.

On the international dimension there have been instances of trafficking of persons between Ghana and other West African countries. There have been reports from the Middle East and Europe of African women who were lured there on promises of jobs or even marriages only for them to find themselves into forced prostitution. Men have ended up working virtually for free for traffickers to who they are indebted in amounts they cannot easily work to pay off and be free individuals.

All these necessitated because of poverty, which is a major push factor of victims of trafficking. The Holy Father, in his message for World Day of Peace 2009 focuses on combating poverty. The World Day of Peace is celebrated on January 1, every year.

While dilating on the Holy Father's thought provoking message, there is the need to take also a look at adults who believe that it is only outside of their communities or countries that they can make a living, who end up in the hands of the modern day slave traders and slave masters, if they do not have any well plan and thought agenda on where they are going.

With these phenomena, many calls have been made by distinguished personalities on the prosecution of persons involved in human trafficking. A former Director of Ghana Immigration Service, Ms. Elizabeth Adjei, speaking at an Anti-Human Trafficking Training and Capacity Building workshop for law enforcement professionals in Accra, said only one prosecution had been done successfully so far, although the immigration service and the police had made a number of arrests and cited that in 2007 alone, the Service intercepted 26 persons who were being trafficked.

According to the Immigration head 'The Human Trafficking Act, Act 694, can only be implemented to the letter, if arrests made by the police, immigration and the Customs, Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS) are successfully prosecuted.'

It is horrific that crimes associated with trafficking sometimes include dangerous acts such as detention, rape and undermine national and international security.

The International Labour Organisation estimates in its global report that $32 billion was generated annually through the exploitation of men, women and children. People are recruited in a variety of ways through the promise of good jobs only to find that they are in debt to traffickers and thus obliged to work for little or no remuneration.

Stressing on the need for effective networking among security agencies in the fight against human trafficking and also for joint investigative mechanism among the agencies is one of the surest ways of curbing the menace.

There are several suggestions including that the ECOWAS Parliament should develop pro-poor and affirmative action policies to curb human trafficking in the West-African sub-region.

At a training Conference on Trafficking for Religious held from January 20-25, 2008 at Nairobi, Kenya, participants from Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Cameroon, Malawi, Ethiopia and Kenya, mainly Reverend Sisters and women from other faith based groups working in the area of human trafficking, considered the situation as being awaken by many emotions.

From the training, it became evident that many people know very little about trafficking and therefore awareness raising programmes were very essential. The Reverend Sisters from the Committee in the Support for the Dignity of Women, Nigeria (COSUDOW) at the conference stressed the importance of identifying the target groups and equally important to build up good relationships with the police, immigration and government officials.

Encouraged by the support and networking with all groups counteracting trafficking, an African Network against Human Trafficking (ANAHT) was formed at the Nairobi Conference.

One thing which is very pitiful is when young girls get into prostitution; they are easily introduced to drugs so that they can take on many men during a single night.

With the efforts of the various groups in the Catholic Church, like the Reverend Sisters, to wage war against human trafficking, it has become common especially in Ghana to hear revealing horrifying stories about how under age girls engage in immoral activities for a meager fee just to make a living.

Sooner or later, countries will have large population of cultureless, religious less and consciously people who do not accept or even understand what love is all about and thus will live without morals. These attitudes could create a looming danger and could be the result of human trafficking.

Some economic mismanagement in some developing countries might have given good course to their national to try to improve their lot through migration. But unfortunately, most of such economic migrants embark on illegal migration and become easily prey to the trafficker.

In some cases, admittedly, in a bid to restructure the Ghanaian economy in some few decades ago, many businesses were sold off or shut down, resulting in workers to fend for themselves. With the difficulties faced by parents, children were left to cater for themselves, while some were trafficked into modern slavery. Some were also lured to go to the cities for greener pastures only to end up in the streets as is evident in the upsurge of street hawking in the cities of Accra, Kumasi and Takoradi.

In Ghana today, prostitution by women and young girls has become the order of the day as they shamelessly parade at public places in the night soliciting for men. These behaviours need serious attention by the government, civil societies, religious bodies, the private sector and organisations.

It is not a means by chance that the Catholic Church stands out tall among others as one human institution which wants to advance both the spiritual and temporal course of man.

Since 2001 to now, the Ghana government embarked on economic management policies which they claim would give hope and confidence to the youth in particular in the country to help develop and grow the economy.

According to the government very positive results were achieved in helping wage war against human trafficking. Policies like the so called capitation grant; free bus ride to school children and the school feeding programme have been introduced which offer considerable relief to poor families to prevent parents resorting to giving up their children for engagements into modern forms of slavery such as labour in the fishing industry or stone quarry at very tender ages.

The introduction of the National Youth Employment Programme is another area the government feels is making strides to curb the situation and the surest way to eliminate the menace when the youth are gainfully employed.

Ghana has relevant and adequate legal infrastructure in place to prevent trafficking in persons as well as rescue victims of this modern day business in persons. The Human Trafficking Act (Act 560), the Domestic Violence Act (Act 732), the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act are all in place and if effectively implemented, the modern day slave trade and slaveries could be eliminated.

It is also time Ghanaians take into serious consideration the following:

Parents should educate their fellow parents most especially the illiterates on the effects and consequences of human trafficking.

Parents should do well to pay regular visits to relative and friends who adopt their children.

The schools should incorporate into the curricula issues related to human trafficking at all levels of the educational system.

The schools should further give correct formation and information about the real values of life based on reciprocal respect and the correct use of one's sexuality.

The media should project a complete balanced and accurate image of women and her femininity to restore her full human value and to present her as a subject and not a mere object.

The media should further expose all who condone with perpetrators on the human trade.

The Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO's) should widen their network and scope in skills training and small enterprise development projects to reach more families of trafficked children and women.

The Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies should collaborate with various traditional councils to eradicate out-moded cultural practices such as forced marriages, Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), Trokosi.

Churches and mosques should promote dignity of every woman created in God's image and offer a religious view of sexuality and man-woman relations.

The church should resource the youth who are the promoters, victims as well as the solution to the human trafficking menace to sensitize and educate their peers.

The church additionally should use their mediums to offer prayers to God to save the human trade.

According to the students, the hope for prostitutes and for all the rejected and marginalized in society is found in the wonderful hymn of praise and thanksgiving raised by Mary, Jesus' Mother, the woman of the Magnificent and mother par excellence, the one who contains all the aspiration of every woman.

Since she belonged to the category of the Anawin, Yahweh's poor, she could take care of all the faceless, the nameless and the voiceless and proclaim the greatness and omnipotence of her God.

'He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones but lifted up the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good things, the rich he has sent away empty (Luke 1: 52 - 53)'.

Though trafficking in human beings is a "tremendous offense to dignity," there is no easy solution to this multifaceted and international problem.

Participants From The International Movement Of Catholic Students (IMCS) Posed For A Group Photograph With Most Rev. Matthew Gyamfi – Bishop Of Catholic Diocese Of Sunyani After The Opening Session Of The Human Trafficking Workshop In Sunyani

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