NAPTIP collaborate with A-TIPSOM, FIAPP and JIFORM to increase awareness on the menace of human trafficking in Nigeria
The move to curb the rising human trafficking and illegal migration by Nigerians will reduce to the barest minimal when Nigerians see the country as the best place to live.
However, government at all levels have been charged to block all loopholes for corruption while providing friendly environment for youg Nigerians to succeed.
The Director of Training and Research at the National Agency for Prohibition In Trafficking in Persons, Mr Arinze Orakwue said high level of corruption among politicians which had almost destroyed the economy made some Nigerians vulnerable for human trafficking.
While speaking in Lagos at the closing of a 3-Day workshop for capacity building for Media Executives organised by NAPTIP in conjuction with FIAPP/ A-TIPSOM, funded by European Union, Orakwue said some Nigerians became vulnerable due to bad governance in the country.
He however noted that consent from the survivors does not exonerate the perpetrators of human trafficking since it violates their human rights and international Treaty.
Mr Orakwue further explained that the closure of schools also gave room for the prevalence of young Nigerians to want to travel abroad for so called “Greener pasture” without considering the inherent dangers.
He cautioned parents against abandoning their responsibility to the care givers or maids who most times created avenue for human traffickers to take full advantage of the situation.
On the advise for teaching of human trafficking in the school curriculum, the NAPTIP Director added that some tertiary institutions in the country have already inculcated it in their programme.
He said record shows that 50% of acts of human trafficking were carried out among family members of the survivors.
Mr Orakwue hinted that depletion in government funding had affected the frequency in exposures of their actitivities in the Media saying a Task Force had been set up in states to provide home grown solution to the menace.
Countries including Niger, Ghana, Gambia and Sierra Leone he said have set up their own version of NAPTIP towards a coordinated efforts within ECOWAS region to combat the Illicit acts.
Also speaking, the Benin Zonal Commander , Mr Nduka Nwanwene decried what he described as the soft judgement passed against convicted human traffickers that allowed payment of fines to set them free.
He noted that the manner in which some churches misled some Nigerians to travel abroad over unrealistic promises must be checked while such religious leaders arrested and prosecuted.
The Benin Zonal Commander who described affickers as very rich and connected said they were recently at the Palace of Olu of Warri to collaborate on how to curb young girls trafficked to people working offshore.
In his submission at the workshop, the President of Journalists International Forum for Migration, JIFORM, Dr Abayomi Ajibola charged participants not to abandom the lessons from the forum as it has made them become authority in the field.
He insists that the Media should see it as their full responsibility to educate the society at large on the dangers inherent in the menace.
Dr Abayomi added that NAPTIP had set a goal for the participants to also review the manual generated from the forum.
