This was said by Javu Baloyi, the spokes person of the Commission for Gender Equality, who was addressing a Human Trafficking Awareness campaign in Johannesburg last Friday. Baloyi said some people were taking advantage of the coming World Cup to traffic people into South Africa to use them as sex slaves and labourers. He said: There is an increase because of the coming World Cup. Some people are deceived and promised work …some are kept in fancy houses in Sandton or Randburg, underground houses, drugged and used as sex slaves.
Baloyi said the perpetrators were believed to be highly connected to the politicians, police and various governments like the Ministry of Home Affairs. He said some girls in the Eastern Cape had been taken from poor rural areas like Limpopo to be trained and used as sex slaves. He also said the opening of borders between South Africa and Zimbabweans, although done with good intentions, was being abused by the human traffickers, making it difficult for South African law enforcers to arrest.
Baloyi said he was concerned by reports that some Zimbabwean women were selling sex in exchange of money as little as R 5 and R10 to survive. He said most of these women were being brought in illegally before they were drugged and used in brothels. They were thrown out if they get sick or about to die. Recently two women from Thailand escaped from their captor to the embassy of Thailand and stated that they were trafficked into South Africa and had their passports taken away before used as sex slaves in a brothel.
A South African woman, who asked to remain anonymous, told the gathering that her Zimbabwean friend came to South Africa with omalayisha (transporters). She said the woman was sexually abused after the sister of the woman failed to pay the transporters. Priscilla Sonto Chishong, from the City of Johannesburg Migrant Desk, who coordinated the campaign said they convened the campaign after noticing an upsurge in human trafficking. Chishong, who assists foreigners by referring them to the relevant officers, said some foreigners were scared to come out in the open that they were trafficked into South Africa.
Some come to our offices and are scared to talk about it (trafficking) but open up after we have talked to them. We are trying to spread the word so that people can be aware of it. We have to tighten our laws and the police have to be vigilant. Although she could not give human trafficking statistics, it was believed some syndicates were targeting the World Cup to make money on defenceless women, some who were kidnapped.
Post published in: Politics