Identifying the nexus between extreme poverty and human trafficking

Aisha (not her real name) sits nervously outside one of the small business centres at the popular Banex Plaza, Wuse II, Abuja.

She is keeping an appointment with a travel agent that is processing the documents for her emigration to Saudi Arabia where a new life and decent job have been promised to her.

Her anxiety and reluctance to speak were evident in the short responses she gave to the questions asked her.

Aisha, in her 20s, heard about the opportunity to travel abroad in a WhatsApp broadcast she came across in Kaduna.

She said at least some of her friends had taken up the opportunity through the same agent. They are now in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Gulf states where they work as domestic staff.

From inference, Aisha's local travel agent works with an international travel syndicates who facilitate documentation and recruitment for their clients, usually young women.

What those people will not tell Aisha and other young women desperate to earn a better living is that, in most cases, their action constitutes human trafficking or modern slavery.

Luring young women to the Gulf countries and other parts of the world for cheap labour is not the only lucrative form of human trafficking being employed by traffickers abroad and their agents in Nigeria.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) says the number of potential victims of sex trafficking arriving by boat in Italy has increased by almost 600 per cent in the past three years.

Tellingly, 80 per cent of them are Nigerians.

Perpetrators also send their victims through torturous routes, especially in largely ungoverned parts of Libya to cross the Mediterranean in overloaded boats into Europe.

Human trafficking has been variously defined by conventions, civil society organisations and public institutions, but there is a common agreement that trafficking in persons is illegal, criminal and inhuman.

Unfortunately, Nigeria, like many other African countries, happens to be at the centre of human trafficking.

Reports from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and other such institutions commissioned at different stages regard Nigeria as a source, transit and destination country for human trafficking.

What this means is that Nigeria not only illegally export humans to be used for sexual exploitation and forced labour, traffickers from other countries commit the crime through Nigerian routes but that victims are transported in the country to work.

Human trafficking is said to be the world's third largest organised crime, only lower than drugs and trade in arms.

In Mexico, for instance, human trafficking is a 30-billion-dollar-a-year organised crime second only to drugs deal.

It is often directly linked to other forms of social problems either as a causal or resultant factor.

For instance, in most war-torn African countries, the use of child soldiers by rebel groups has fuelled the demand for trafficked children.

The gender factor in human trafficking is also staggering as over 80 per cent of victims of trafficking are women and children.

Whether it is for forced labour or sexual exploitation, there are many reasons why young women fall victim of human trafficking.

However, poverty plays a crucial role in oiling the supply chain of human trafficking.

It also serves as a stumbling block against any meaningful anti-human trafficking campaign because immediate financial gains could still lure victims and parents into trafficking.

To Aisha and other young women, the recruitment agency was doing them a favour of a lifetime, after all, their travel documentation and flight expenses would be covered by their potential employers.

Experts say extreme poverty, knitted in unsustainable population growth, is the singular most disturbing phenomenon in the fight against many social vices and crimes such as human trafficking.

It is no accident that countries with the highest poverty rates on the one hand, and those with unmanageably high population on the other hand, form the supply chain of human trafficking.

The correlation between extreme poverty, population and human trafficking is so strong that densely populated countries with efficient economic growth still find themselves in the mess of human trafficking among the poor.

The Philippines, China, India and Brazil are some valid examples.

Experts also warn that, with poverty and population simultaneously on the increase, human trafficking may continue unabated.

"Perpetrators only have to device new techniques to lure poor members of the society into the practice with little resistance.

"This is because victims see it as an opportunity to break away from extreme poverty," Dr Fatima Akilu, a social psychologist warned.

However, according to Global Fund to End Modern Slavery, 99 per cent of migrants to the Gulf as domestic staff had been abused.

Ranging from the confiscation of their passports to unfairly withholding their wages, to suffering physical abuse and sexual violence, victims are subjected to varying degree of exploitation.

In some cases some victims end in loss of life.

In June, the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) admitted that dishonest persons hide under various façades to deceive, defraud, and lure naïve victims to foreign countries.

The exploitation, NAPTIP said, often takes the form of sexual exploitation, forced labour, debt bondage, slavery and removal of organs.

A new report, 'Global Estimates of Modern Slavery,' published by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) shows that criminal syndicates operating under various pretexts hold more than 28 million people in abject subjugation on account of those factors NAPTIP highlighted.

Modern slavery is a global epidemic driven by extreme poverty and traffickers deliberately target the most poor and vulnerable population as a means of exploitation.

Unfortunately, extreme poverty will continue to power supply in trafficked persons, regardless of other measures put in place to mitigate the international crime.

Therefore, governments, multi-lateral organisations and other institutions should invest more in ending global extreme poverty.

Fortunately, the Federal Government has promised to bring its resources to bear to end human trafficking.

"Trafficking in Person is a scourge; it is a compendium of denied opportunities going up to as far as modern-day slavery.

"It is a challenge and a scourge that has to be fought and brought to a standstill.

"The government of Nigeria is determined in this effort and all our agencies and partners will continue to work hand in hand to find how to conquer this scourge," says Interior Minister, Mr Rauf Aregbesola.