By Nasratu Kargbo
One of the commitments made by Members of the Economic Community for West Africa States (ECOWAS) in a communiqué signed in Freetown on the 26th of April 2023 is to find the cause and address child exploitation in the region.
Reading a Communiqué on behalf of other Ministers in the ECOWAS member states, Sierra Leone’s Minister of Social Welfare Baindu Dassama during the conference in Freetown said they made a commitment to identifying and addressing the causes of trafficking, including negative cultural and gender practices, child exploitation, pervasion amongst others.
She added that they are committed and focused on implementing the ECOWAS child policy and strategic plan of action from 2019 to 2030. Amongst the key priority areas highlighted is the ECOWAS regional plan on the elimination of child labour and forced labour and the ECOWAS road map on preventing and responding to child marriage.
The Communiqué stated that they intend to integrate human rights response-based measures to human trafficking, criminal justice, social workforce, and regulatory initiative in order to address vulnerability to sexual and gender-based violence, violence against children, and other related victimization.
She said that they intend to strengthen the capacity of criminal justice practitioners which include law enforcement and judicial officers to detect, investigate, prosecute, and adjudicate trafficking in persons and related offences and ensure the protection of victims.
The minister stated that the region is bent on creating a mechanism to ensure the effective investigation and prosecution of human trafficking cases.
Sierra Leone’s Vice President Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh PhD said the purpose of the conference is to amplify the fight against human trafficking.
He said Sierra Leone has improved legislation, prosecution amongst others, but noted that despite all the things done at the national level they’ve not been able to achieve the intended impact that they wished for. He stated that the intention of the conference is geared towards actualizing that vision in order to stop the menace in the region.
The VP said the road map that is developed during the conference will serve as a tool to deepen regional coordination in enhancing the region’s effort to prevent, protect, prosecute, and build more strategic partnerships.
During the conference, they played a video of Sierra Leonean survivors of trafficking that explained the suffering they had to endure. All of them travelled seeking greener pastures, mostly in countries in the Middle East; they paid a huge sum of money to people who said they were agents.
Upon their arrival to their different destinations, they stated that their passports were seized, and stressed that their expectations on the types of jobs that they were promised by their agents were not met. They stated that they had to work as maids and laborers in those countries, were treated cruelly by their bosses, nearly raped amongst other inhuman acts.
They, therefore, called on the government to create jobs, saying that if they had better jobs in Sierra Leone, they would not be tempted to go elsewhere and encounter such inhumane treatment.
Copyright © 2023 Politico (03/05/23)
