Two Teenage Nigerian Sex Slaves Rescued From Burkina Faso

Two teenage Nigerian female prostitutes [names withheld], have been rescued from Burkina Faso where they were used as money making sex slaves.

The teenage prostitutes, who are between the ages of 15 and 16 respectively, have been rescued and brought back to Nigeria by officials of Lutra Jeunes, a Burkina Faso-based non government organisation working in conjunction with the South-South Peoples’ Association In Diaspora, another organisation working against child labour and human trafficking.

Speaking with P.M NEWS yesterday, the President of Lutra Jeunes, Ochuko P. Otoba, said the teenage sex slaves are indigenes of Agbor in Delta State, Nigeria.

Otoba said that the young girls were sold to the trafficker, who eventually turned them to sex slaves for a sum equivalent to N250, 000 each. And in a bid to make profit from the illicit transaction, the trafficker turned the young and innocent girls to sex slaves.

He added that his organisation was alerted by the Burkina Faso government of the incident, and “we called the attention of the Nigerian Embassy here, but when they did not respond, we decided to take these steps on our own.”

The girls have however been handed over to the National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons and other related matters [NAPTIP] with its head office at Oba-Ladejobi Street, G.R.A. Ikeja, Lagos.

In a letter signed by Josiah Emerole, the Head, Lagos Zone of NAPTIP, he promised that his organisation will conduct proper investigation on the matter and commending Lutra Jeunes for tackling the menace of human trafficking in Burkina Faso.

In their confessional statements, the two sisters said their ordeal started when a native doctor in their village introduced someone to their father. The person, according to them, promised to take them to Upper Volta with the consent of their father.

The girls said when they were told of the plan to travel to ‘Upper Volta,’ they were so elated, hoping that it was a European country where they will enjoy a good life. But they didn’t know that the man they were travelling with had a different plan.

According to Otoba, a lot of Nigerian female teenagers are being trafficked to Burkina Faso on daily basis for prostitution, but reckoned his organisation needs more support to fight the menace more effectively.

“Before our faces, our daughters and sisters are sold to fellow Nigerians and non-Nigerians in Burkina Faso who use them for prostitution. There is hardly any Nigerian in Burkina Faso that had not travelled with traffickers bringing the girls to Burkina Faso from Nigeria. The traffickers and the slaves are taking the same vehicle that we all took from Nigeria to Burkina Faso and we choose to look the other way. It is evil to see evil and look the other way. The next victim may be your close relative. And that is why we want all hands to be on deck in fighting these human traffickers.

“Nigerian Embassy and many good Nigerians in Burkina Faso had helped the few Nigerians that escaped from traffickers to go back to their families in Nigeria, but efforts to combat trafficking had yielded little results. Few traffickers had been arrested, fined or jailed only to come back and continue in their evil deeds. The issues of trafficking have overwhelmed all of us. It seems impossible to combat,” Otoba lamented.

—Bayo Adetu