Nigerian Girls Being Trafficked in Italy
NOTE: The phrase “physically intimate” is substituted in many cases below due to abusive realities on the web and in the physical world.
In some cases there was no way to make the substitution work, and the word “xxx” was used instead. Hopefully, there will come a day where this is no longer an issue…..
African women being forced in prostitution by traffickers operating in Africa and Italy are raising headlines. The problem has increased 600% in the last 3 years, and is being fueled by mafia, religious authorities ( christian as well as african ), and most likely some corrupted government officials as well.
Religious beliefs are being exploited to help in the process. The girls are put through ceremonies where a curse is put on them to control them. Clergymen are also participating in the trade, further demoralizing anyone who would try to break free. Many people in Nigeria and Ghana have a perception of Benin as being a place where juju and juju-related complexities are a common reality in life.
What can you do to help?
I haven’t seen much on the net about helping with the situation. Until more information is available the activities I would see as helping in this issue would be:
- Find organizations trying to help, in Italy, in the U.N., and others
- Post information about these organizations to Blogs and News sites
- Post information about how these organizations are collecting money so people can contribute
- Post information about how the various organizations are making progress
- Post information about organizations that have been corrupted, or were created fraudulently
Mojakore / Jahmakeyah will follow-up further on this issue.
Related news posts:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/09/14/nigerian-girls-young-13-increasingly-trafficked-italy-work-street/
Nigerian girls as young as 13 are promised jobs as baby sitters and hairdressers once they arrive in Italy but instead end up on the streets selling themselves for as little as 10 euros (£8.90) a time, terrified into submission by gang rape and voodoo curses.
Teenage girls and young women sitting on beer crates or cheap plastic chairs in dusty lay-bys are a common sight on the periphery of Italy’s major cities, and even along country lanes in places such as Tuscany and Umbria
Of the 100,000 migrants who have been rescued at sea so far this year and brought to Italy, 15 per cent were Nigerian.
“There are girls aged 13, 14 and 15 on the streets now – a lot of them are under age. They are so young and they are living such terrible experiences,” said Anna Pozzi, an expert on the “xxx” trade and the author of a book, Slave Merchants.
“They come from desperately poor families. Many have not been to school and are illiterate. They dream of a better life in Europe, they see Italy as a paradise. They are getting younger and younger,” said the author, who has travelled extensively in Nigeria to research trafficking networks.
Some of the women have only the vaguest idea of where they are heading, but worry about having to cross “a very wide river” – by which they mean the Mediterranean.
It is estimated that 80 per cent of Nigerian teenage girls and young women who make it to Italy are forced into the “xxx” trade.
Additional references:
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