Stop the Traffic.

My Urge : #STOPTHETRAFFIC

I grew up in Nigeria, precisely in Lagos State. So let me tell you a little about growing up in Nigeria . Now, if you were from a home that have infants or children below the age of 10 yeras or let me say that home that has a little bit of luxury, I would not be mincing words that your parents will be able to give you some perks as a child especially in the areas of having a nanny watch over you while your parents are away at their place of work. 

The process of getting such caretakers commonly called `House Girl’, is where they go to the rural part of the country and girls who are always at least 99% the available persons for such trafficking. This is due to the fact that we were told that the girls cannot do much at the farms and the best gender to assist in the house help task will always be the female . Let me say this scenario I just painted is usually for one-on-one meetings where you need no middle man to actually foster the taking away of the girl child to the city.

Over the years this fad actually evolved, I will list a few;

• ·         Where an agent goes to the rural area and packs girls in dozens who he takes to the township and promises them the house girl job. This pattern is where I decide I want a maid and then he offers to bring one over to my house or office, I will run necessary health checks where necessary and then I give him a token and he avails her to me. The monthly contract is paid to the agent indirectly as he actually provides a bank account number where I pay the wages into. The bank account never belongs to the girl who now works for you but instead goes to the purse of the agent and at the end of the tenure he decides how much he will give to the girl after spending months in your home.

• ·         We have another scenario where young teenage girls who get pregnant and then they agree to a signup fee and are taken into a nursing home where they will be fed for months and at the time of delivery the babies are swapped with a paltry sum of money between Fifty to One hundred thousand Naira and they sell of their babies to willing parents who as a result of infertility or unable to have kids of their own and then decide buy the new born babies. Sometimes the middle men get as much as 300% profit while the real mother of the child parts with her child at little or no fees.

• ·         We have another scenario where parents who are unable to send their children to school also approach a middle man who they give off their girl children between the ages of 3-8. This caliber are either for parents who want already grown up girl children due to their age and they feel they are not so capable to take on new born babies and have a preference for already grown girl children and then an agreed sum is for the agents to pay off the parents.

• ·         Lastly is the female sex workers who can be seen in strip clubs and brothels. Houses are provided by their mistresses and then the girls have to trade their bodies in order to pay their monthly rent while sexually satisfying the male guests at the various outfits.

·         Lately we have some religious bigots who use young female girls to satisfy their sexual urge and at the same time require them to give fake testimonies to their willing crowd to deceive the congregation.

Currently I have a GirlChild campaign page on Face book where I am particular about the wellness of the GirlChild and this topic touches base on things I am aligned with. This is the platform I need to propagate this gospel against trafficking. I am interested in taking a shot at this as we have a lot of young girls particularly in my community who were affected in this and never had the chance to attain a proper education.

My greatest challenge will be having community leaders be committed to this as we have a vast majority particularly in the areas of child trafficking where the high and mighty up till date still patronize the house girl syndrome platform as they are used as maids to serve their families. It’s hard to convince Nigerians on doing away with the house girl syndrome which is very prevalent. Bringing to the front burner that these house girls never rarely have a right to education, their wages and sometimes they go through  sexual and domestic abuse all at the same time and are treated poorly and unjustly.

My Urge: I always wonder why women are the target for all the trafficking in the world. Why are we always labelled as vulnerable and ready? Can women put an end to this by giving a voice and putting an end to this? 

We need to take this campaign to the Community leaders and women leaders to put a voice to this. #Stopthetraffic

This campaign can be included in Nigerian Social Studies Curriculum and can enlighten more people to speak up against it.

Image : Google.com