Malawi sex workers threaten to protest ‘abuse’ by authorities

Sex workers in Malawi have threatened to organise protests to speak out against the abuse they say they face from police and medical practitioners, the Nyasa Times reports today.

“We are not happy that in this age, we sex workers continue to face a lot of abuse and discrimination. When we need help from police and hospital, there is no privacy for us,” the news site quotes a representative of the national sex workers’ union as saying.

Zinenani Majawa, national coordinator of the Sex Workers Association of Malawi, is also reported as saying:

“In two weeks time we have arranged meetings with police and the ministry of health to present our complaints and if we are not assisted after that, we will hold demonstrations across the country.”

The UN children’s agency agency, Unicef, earlier this year warned that droughts and crop failure have increasingly forced teenage girls to sell sex.

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