Human trafficking affecting children in South Africa

Drugs, prostituition and witchcraft are the feeding reasons for criminal practices in the country.

IOL site (www.iolnews.co.za) broke the news on a case of children traffick with a happy end.

Baby Ovayo, 1year and nine months old, was sold by his own grandmother for R 500,00 to a woman who is suspected to conduct children trafficking in Khayelitsha, Cape Town.

Police was able to find the child and arrest the suspect in response to a tip off given. Grandmother and suspect are arrested and will be judged by kidnapping and eventual children trafficking.

Asiphe, the mother, believes her child would be used for witchcraft rituals, one of the main reasons for the trafficking of children in the African Continent.

This is an organized crime, practiced by well established syndicates, and commonly found in Pretoria, Port Elizabeth, Johannesburg and Bloemfontein, targeting orphans from HIV pandemic that covers the Continent.

These syndicates recruit or kidnap girls at the age band of 8 to 16 for sexual exploitation and boys to be used for forced labor, beggars, drug trafficking or to be used in farm work, without salary or proper food.

Several means of exploitation are prostitution, pornography, forced marriages, domestic servitude, forced labor, begging, harvest of organs ad criminal activities as drug trafficking.

NPA estimates 30 thousand children in prostitution, 264 thousand in forced labor, a profitable industry of R 70 billions per year and about 40 thousand people crossing our boarders, victims of traffic.

These children are taken from rural areas and from countries with higher poverty levels. It is mentioned that a child can be purchased, in Malawi, for as little as R 50,00; one young lady from Mozambique values from R 500,00 to R 700,00. This lady will entertain 15 clients a day, even if she falls sick or pregnant.

The only viable way to minimize human traffic, that slaves over 27 million people worldwide, is to spread the message and to make people aware of false promises for employment, carrier or better living conditions offered as deceiving propaganda to attract innocent ones.