|
Caught In Traffic
| Date: |
28 January 2007 12:00 |
| Producer: |
First Edit
|
| Show: | Carte Blanche |
Every month thousands of children are smuggled by greedy opportunists and syndicates across our international and provincial borders. Once on the other side, they are sold as domestic workers, for criminal activities, or for hard labour on farms.
And many of the young girls are forced into prostitution.
[2001] Jabu: 'She said to the man 'Take Jabu'. I went with the guy to the park. The guy told me to take off my clothes, so I did. Afterwards he paid the money to Daisy'.'
Ruda Landman (Carte Blanche presenter): 'We first met this little girl - we'll call her Jabu - five years ago. This was our first insight into the murky underworld of child trafficking.'
Since then, the International Organisation for Migration, or IOM, estimates that close to 1000 women and children are being trafficked across the Mozambique border into South Africa alone, each year.
The purpose for the exploitation? ... an estimated R1million annually.
We spoke to Zipho, whose relative is a child trafficker working along this border.
Agent 1: 'How much do you sell for?'
Zipho: 'R390 or R400.'
Agent 1: 'So do you know what these kids are going to do, when you sell them to these people?'
Zipho: 'They are going to sleep with the black people and the white man.'
When it comes to child trafficking, Jabu's story is not uncommon.
The 10-year-old grew up in a small village near the Lebombo Border between South Africa and Mozambique. The young girl had her whole life ahead of her.
But that would all change one morning when Jabu's mother sent her out to buy bread, and a woman called Daisy intercepted her.
Jabu: 'The lady told me she must accompany me to the shop.'
Jabu recognised the woman as her mother's friend and, not wanting to disrespect her elder, agreed.
Unknowingly, Jabu had put her fate into the hands of a ruthless child trafficker.
Ruda: 'Daisy took Jabu on a long journey from home... first on a taxi, then on a train. They ended up in Rosettenville, Johannesburg.'
It's unclear just how long after arriving in the city Jabu was first raped, but she remembers that Daisy first sold her to a man in a white car.
Ruda: 'Did you know what he wanted when he said 'Take off your clothes.' Did you know why?'
Jabu: 'No.'
Ruda: 'And then what did he do? Did you fight him? Did he hurt you?'
Jabu: 'I fought with the guy, but then he put a gun to my head.'
Ruda: 'And then, did he just take you back to Daisy?'
Jabu: 'Yes.'
André Neethling is the South African Police Services provincial co-ordinator for child protection in Gauteng.
Supt. André Neethling (SAPS Gauteng): 'Youth sells. There is unfortunately a market, and people would actually go out and try and source children for sex.'
Having worked on Jabu's case, he says women are often the first contact made on the human trafficking route because they appear less threatening.
Pretending to be relatives or acquaintances of the child's family, these traffickers take their victims to waiting taxis or trains, transporting them across borders to bigger cities.
Ruda: 'Some of the children who are abducted or lured away from their homes don't get far beyond the border, and many of them end up here at Amazing Grace - a place of safety in Malelane near Nelspruit.'
Daniel Sikhonza is the project manager at Amazing Grace. He says the home has been experiencing a wave of child trafficking cases over the past few years.
Ruda: 'Boys or girls?'
Daniel Sikhonza (Amazing Grace Children's Home): 'Both sexes... boys and girls.'
According to the International Organisation for Migration, Southern Africa has become a fertile ground for human trafficking. Fuelled by poverty, the booming South African economy can seem irresistible to those looking for a better life.
We spoke to Jonathan Martens from the IOM.
Jonathan Martens (IOM Programme Manager): 'A street child in South Africa, or Lesotho, or Swaziland, or any of the neighbouring countries, is in a vulnerable position and they are going to take opportunities that are offered.'
Geo was only nine-years-old when both his parents died and he was forced onto the streets.
He was making a living washing taxis in Maputo, Mozambique, when a man approached him, promising him a better life in Johannesburg.
Ruda: 'Why did you go with him? Did you like the idea?'
Geo: 'I liked the idea because he said I could live with him. There would be other children living there.'
The man then smuggled the small boy into South Africa, but abandoned him just outside Malelane. A community worker brought him to Amazing Grace.
Daniel: 'If they bring the child of which maybe the client doesn't like, maybe they dump her somewhere along the M4 or maybe at the border.'
According to Daniel, at any given time, the home houses between five to ten children who have been trafficked.
Daniel: 'The majority they're from Mozambique, because the traffickers, they are busy, there at the Komartipoort Border.'
After speaking to Daniel, and with the IOM statistics in mind, we wanted to see just how easy it would be to make contact with child traffickers.
Our two undercover agents made their way to Komatipoort on the North Eastern border of Mpumalanga.
Within the first few hours they were directed to a nearby tavern where they were told to find either a man called 'Dumisani' or the 'Queen' of trafficking, a woman called Nolwisa.
Dumisani was nowhere to be found, but Nolwisa was at home and lived across the road from the tavern.
Nolwisa was clearly unnerved by our agents' visit and seemed more interested in washing dishes than any potentially new business.
But our agents persisted and eventually Nolwisa explained she had been questioned in November 2006 under suspicion of human trafficking. Clearly annoyed, she left, directing us elsewhere.
Nolwisa: 'If you want children, visit Dumisani.'
It seemed as though we had run out of leads. But just as we were about to leave, a relative of Nolwisa, Zipho, approached us and agreed to spill the beans if we promised to hide her identity.
We asked her where Nolwisa found children to sell.
Zipho: 'They steal them in Maputo.'
She also said it was possible to buy children from their parents.
Agent 1: 'Do they tell the parents what they are going to do with the child?'
Zipho: 'No.'
Agent 1: 'Do the parents sell them?'
Zipho: 'Yes.'
Agent 1: 'Yes, their parents sell them.'
Agent 2: 'How much?'
Agent 1: 'For how much?'
Zipho: 'R50 to R100.'
Jonathan: 'There are tremendous profits to be made from trafficking persons. Human beings, unlike drugs or oft-time weapons, are a renewable resource. You can use a person many, many times over.'
According to IOM statistics it is estimated that 800 000 people around the world are trafficked every year, with trafficking syndicates netting almost R50 billion a year.
The problem in Africa has gotten so out of hand that in July 2006, 26 African countries met in Abuja, Nigeria, and adopted a joint plan to fight the trafficking of people on the continent.
Jonathan: 'The definition - at least in terms of protocol - is that trafficking involves recruitment and transportation of an individual by means of deception, fraud [or] force for the purposes of exploitation.'
And according to Jonathan, cash does not always have to be exchanged in order for
trafficking to take place, nor does the exploitation have to involve sex.
Nellie was 11 years old when she was abducted from her home in Swaziland, while her sisters and mother were out. A woman pretending to be her aunt took her to a farm in Barberton where she was forced to do domestic work and hard labour.
Ruda: 'You say she beat you up?'
Nellie: 'She would come back and find that I hadn't done all the work she had given me. She would beat me up for that. The work was too much for me and so I couldn't finish it in time.'
Ruda: 'What did she beat you with?'
Nellie: 'She used something that looked like a cane.'
But despite international and local attention, the tide of human trafficking worldwide seems to be on the rise.
Ruda: 'Human trafficking usually entails crossing borders, with crimes being committed in different countries. For that reason, as well as because very few countries have specific legislation in making trafficking as such a crime, it is really difficult to combat.'
Jonathan: 'How do we investigate something for which there is no definition in South African law?'
Currently child traffickers in South Africa can only be prosecuted under the statutory rape clause of the Sexual Offences Act and the Childcare Act.
But André says that the difficulty with this is that the whole case then rests on the evidence of a traumatised child.
André 'These children are very erratic. They would support you now. When they get the urge for drugs again, they would run away from the place of safety. So we have a very low success rate in terms of prosecution of these people.'
According to André, many trafficked young girls like Jabu are introduced to drugs soon after being abducted.
Within hours after being brought to Johannesburg, Daisy took Jabu to a drug den.
Jabu: 'We went to 11 14 and we found some other brothers. Daisy told me that these brothers are smoking a pill. These pills were drugs.. drug.'
Shortly after our interview, Jabu ran away from the place of safety where she was being taken care of.
It was clear that the little girl had already started selling herself on her own initiative. Tempted by the idea of a trip to the seaside, she and a friend had hitched a ride with a trucker to Durban.
Jabu: 'He slept with both of us. In the morning we went to the sea. 'Snay' (the friend) smoked some glue.'
Zipho: 'They say they need the small ladies because they are ripe.'
Agent 1: 'What do you mean 'when they are ripe?' '
Zipho: 'Because they are young.'
Ruda: 'While many of the girls end up on the streets of Johannesburg, this is not the only destination. There are markets in every major city in South Africa.'
Around the same time that Jabu disappeared, Carte Blanche accompanied the Durban
Child Protection Unit, Childline and the South African Police Services on a raid of a nightclub and suspected brothel on the city's beachfront.
We arrived to find the club packed full of patrons and sex workers of all races and nationalities. And of the many under-age girls found on the raid, some were local while others were clearly from across our borders.
The club had rooms at the back, where the men had sex with the girls. One under-age girl who was taken into care was found in one of the rooms with her client when we burst in with the police.
Ruda: 'Who should be doing more?'
Jonathan: 'Everybody should do more. IOM should be doing more, donor communities should be doing more, the government should be doing more, and civil society should be doing more.'
Currently the SA Law reform is in the final stages of [a] draft bill dealing with trafficking. It is hoped this legislation criminalising human trafficking will be promulgated in the next two years.
Jonathan: 'The question arises: 'What do we do in the meantime?' And that is a challenge.'
IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER:While every attempt has been made to ensure this transcript or summary is accurate, Carte Blanche or its agents cannot be held liable for any claims arising out of inaccuracies caused by human error or electronic fault. This transcript was typed from a transcription recording unit and not from an original script, so due to the possibility of mishearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, errors cannot be ruled out.
|