African Judges and Prosecutors on Human Trafficking and Organized Crime

Vatican City—A two-day Summit of African Women Judges and Prosecutors on Human Trafficking and Organized Crime, hosted by The Pontifical Academy of Sciences at the Vatican, brought nearly 50 women together to identify and address the causes and effects of these crimes against humanity. Blue Chip Foundation founder Jennifer Gross sponsored the event to help further the Sustainable Development Goals – including SDG 8.7, which directly involves efforts to end human trafficking and modern slavery. 

Africa holds vast numbers of human trafficking victims, and women judges from across the continent shared their own countries’ stories, citing real-world examples and zeroing in on locally specific issues. These judges are at the forefront of the fight against trafficking, and they see cases that most people struggle to comprehend.

A staggering 14 million people are involuntarily trafficked for labor – and half of them are trafficked into construction, manufacturing and the mining industry. Overall, about 9.5 million men and boys and 4 million women and girls are being pressed into involuntary servitude, sex work and slavery right now.

“What are the causes of trafficking? Poverty is the main cause. Many of these children are orphans that have very little education. The children earn very little money,” said Beninese Justice of the Court of First Instance of Allada, Aubierge Olivia Lucette Hungbo-Kploca. 

Some parents willingly put their children into a network of human trafficking – not just in Benin, but elsewhere – for financial compensation. Benin created a network to target human trafficking, says Magistrate Judge Ayaba Claire Houngan Ayemonna, who quickly discovered that there were both national and international rings trafficking children in particular.

“The internal network takes people from rural areas and transports them to the urban areas,” Ayemonna testified. “The international network transfers them to other countries. They are being moved to Europe or Northern African countries. They are promised a good job in a foreign country. There are parents in a polygamist household, and they send off their children to work. Not to attend school, but to receive renumeration.” 

Forces opposing human trafficking are emerging throughout Africa. Justice Sedina Agbemava of Ghana’s High Court says that there’s a strong movement forming in her home country, Ghana, to stamp out human trafficking.

“To use the word eradicate sounds overly optimistic, but with the provision of adequate resources, the fight against human trafficking will be won,” said Agbemava. “Ghana is seen as a source, transit and destination country, though the perception is that domestic trafficking in humans is more prevalent than international or the transnational trafficking. This perception may be due to the fact that culturally and historically, children especially have been sent to live with other families – they may be relatives or not – mostly due to the inability of parents to take care of these children due to poverty.”

During Agbemava’s tenure as a judge, she dealt with far more international cases than local cases.

Justice of the Court of Appeal in Ghana, the Honorable Lady Justice Mariama Owusu, agrees.

“The new trend in Ghana is young ladies who traveled to the Gulf States and the Middle East countries like Qatar [and] Dubai to be engaged as house-helps,” Owusu said. “A lot of the victims paid traffickers [to] take them to these countries. Some of them have returned home and recounted horrifying stories about their experiences. For instance, as soon as they get to these countries, their employers take their passports and even phones. They are made to work long hours a day under harsh conditions.”

Human trafficking victims are often coached on what to say if they’re arrested, which makes it incredibly difficult to prosecute – or even find – the criminal organization responsible.

“Since it is becoming increasingly difficult to report and prosecute traffickers, education is key. The target should be directed at the public. We need to provide appropriate information on abuses, the signs to look out for and also provide essential services for trafficked persons. This is because all human beings must enjoy fundamental human rights,” said Owusu.

Many trafficking victims across Africa are children. In Kenya, for example, there are countless refugees housed in temporary – and insecure – camps. The country has passed legislation that imposes harsh penalties on traffickers, but criminal organizations are still taking children out of camps and forcing them into sex work and other types of forced labor.

“Kenya’s largest refugee camp complex, Dadaab, hosts hundreds of thousands of refugees and asylum-seekers, and the security situation limits some humanitarian access, assistance, and protective services. Some children in Kenya-based refugee camps may endure sex trafficking, while others are taken from the camps and into forced labor,” says Lady Justice Agnes Kalekye Murgor, who works at the Supreme Court Building in Nairobi.

The penalty in Kenya for “Causing a victim of trafficking in persons to experience any permanent or life-threatening bodily harm; or causing by reason of the act of trafficking in persons, the death of the victim of trafficking or affliction of any other life threatening or terminal health condition” is life imprisonment.

Programs to help victims are also starting to take shape. In Malawi, for example, some victims are entitled to compensation.

“Compensation to a victim of trafficking in persons will not necessary remove the traumatic effects of the process of human trafficking, but it will improve the chances of his or her psychological recovery and eventual reintegration into society as well as assuage his or her feelings. It will also offer economic empowerment and protection from being re-trafficked,” said High Court Judge Fiona Mwale of Malawi.

One of the biggest problems, however, is that victims are afraid of speaking out.

“The victims [are} being taken abroad and are afraid of denouncing what happened to them,” said Luisa Fernandes Chimbila Quinta, who serves as President of the Family Division in the Provincial Court of Huambo, Angola. But, she contends, “We are improving our partnerships with the victims and the witnesses.” The country has implemented specific measures to make it easier to catch and prosecute criminals who traffic other humans, but Quinta says, “The courts must do much more to prevent sex trafficking.”

The most current estimates suggest that there are approximately 50 million victims per year, a figure the Summit addressed. “The more fine tuned we can become in our models presented in this summit, the stronger Africa can become in its policies against sex trafficking. We can no longer accept sex trafficking, the harvesting of organs, or forced child labor to continue,” said 

Blue Chip Foundation Co-Founder, Jennifer Gross.

Blue Chip Foundation sponsored the Summit of African Women to provide a path toward achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Because several factors feed into the current human trafficking crisis, including poverty (the elimination of poverty is SDG 8), Blue Chip Foundation is committed to continue its work in Africa and the rest of the world to help eradicate what Pope Francis has called a “shameful crime.”