End Child Trafficking Menace Now

The media, since last year, has been awash with news of the uncovering of baby factories or illegal maternity homes by security agencies. Most of the homes run by medical doctors contravene natural human relationship laws. This child racketeering centres have been discovered mostly in the South-eastern part of Nigeria, particularly Imo, Abia and Anambra states.

This malaise constitutes a crime against humanity. International treaties and established protocols like the Palermo Protocol on transnational human trafficking frown against this crime. In Nigeria, the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons was established in 2003 to tackle the evil. Besides, the Child Right Acts empower the state to prosecute offenders.

The individual so trafficked loses self esteem.  Imagine the psychological imbalance that trails a child taken away from his parental warmth and subjected to all sorts of ill-treatments. Think also of the pain that teenagers who are unprepared for motherhood are hurriedly made to become pregnant just so that somebody somewhere can profit from buying the baby. Some children, as investigations now show, have ended up in shrines, where they are used as material for black magic and juju practices.

Our laws are clear about punishment for those who denigrate the sanctity of human life. While we blame the local, state and federal governments for tepidly tackling this menace, we call for the correction of this attitude by ensuring that effective steps are taken to curtail this abnormality. Agencies responsible for administering charities dedicated to children must live up to their responsibilities. Their various tiers of government must live up to the billing of providing the essential care to the people, especially innocent girls and children to ensure that they don’t fall prey to unscrupulous people.

Importantly, parents must wake up to the responsibility of caring for their children and wards. It has been observed that a lot of the girls who had to run to so-called charity or maternity homes were driven away from home by their parents and guardians. Similarly, the vexed issue of sex education which the society has derided for so long should be brought to the front burner. Unless this is done, the country will keep facing sex-related problems. We must lift the lid on a sensitive issue that has inhibited the inculcation of education  in our children.

We hope that child trafficking and the baby factory phenomenon doesn’t surpass the menace of  kidnapping in the region and elsewhere. Security agencies should be proactive in tackling this evil. Individuals, communities and cultural organisations and the church must unite to eradicate this ill, thus restoring the dignity of the child. Baby factories or charity homes should be closely monitored so that they don’t deviate from their mandate. The Nigerian child must be saved from these harbingers of evil.