Escape from American ‘hell’
By Sunday Oguntola Published Today News Unrated

Oriola

A Nigerian female journalist who relocated to the United States to join her husband became a victim of human trafficking and sexual abuse, writes Sunday Oguntola with Agency reports



Bukola Oriola, a returnee from the shadow of the valley of death, knows what affliction is all about. She had seen it, tasted it, touched it and lived it. Yet, when she left the shores of Nigeria in 2005 to cover the United Nation’s 60th anniversary and General Assembly in the US, she would have taken on anyone who predicted that she was heading for a serious ordeal. Not when the whole world appeared under her feet. At the now rested National Age Newspapers where she was responsible for producing a three page pull out on education, she was not only a star but also an award-winning journalist.

Her good fortunes literally soared when her US-based Nigerian husband who was introduced to her on phone by a mutual friend begged her to stay back shortly after the UN assignment. "He promised to change my status from a work visa as a journalist to a spousal visa," she recalls at a state Capitol news conference last Thursday in America where for the first time she let out her bottled-up disenchantment. Before then, both families had consented to the union back home in Nigeria. So, she had no hesitation whatsoever. For her, here was a lifetime opportunity to practise her chosen profession in a more organised and rewarding environment. She was also going to be united to a man she was married to traditionally.

But for the next two years, her life was as nightmarish as it was traumatic. The same man she married and looked up to for succour and happiness turned her to a victim of human trafficking. "He isolated me for two years; I suffered hunger, slavery and hardship in his hands," she begins her moving story. She was also placed on confinement even when she was pregnant. "I was alone in the house. I cried to go out. I always look forward to Sundays to go to church because I stayed home for up to three weeks sometimes without going out. I only peep through the window like a prisoner".

Bukola was shocked and devastated by the turn of events. Yet, she was hoping giving him a child was going to change him. The man had told her she was divorced because of childlessness. So, Bukola reckoned the arrival of a child would tame him. Months later she discovered he was only testing the potency of a fertility drug he was taking on her. By then, she was an emotional wreck. She was horrified that the man she gave her heart and life was a big let down. Yet, she held on to the glimmers of hope against all hope. When the baby finally arrived, it was a boy. His arrival however added to Bukola’s misery. "He did not care for his own child. I took care of our son like a single parent when his father was living with us in the home. He would not even provide clothing for his child. Whenever I tried to complain I get punished".

With Bukola cowed and his potency confirmed, it was time to move to the next level of the grand plan. Now, Bukola must earn a living for him and the discovery that she could braid hair was perfectly timed. "He used me as a maid at one of his girlfriend’s shop in Brooklyn Park when I was pregnant. I braided hair while he collected the money. He complained that I was living in free house, eating free food, watching free TV, using free phone and Internet so I should count myself lucky to have these basic stuffs in America" Bukola further reveals.

Yet, the game was far from over. Bukola must satisfy his libido without any consideration for her trauma. "He complained to his friends that I was not giving him enough sex and they called to harass me for not giving my husband enough sex and that I was behaving like an American woman. I became his sex slave." Knowing Bukola could regain her boldness as a former journalist, her supposed husband unleashed a regime of threats and intimidations to continue the oppression. "He constantly threatened me with the law by using police and immigration to harass me. I became depressed to the point that I could no longer see myself in the mirror and I thought only death could take me out of the slavery".

While waiting for death, help came her way surprisingly. It was in the form of a public health nurse who smuggled her and the little boy to safety. She was referred to Alexander House and connected to a support group for immigrant women and kids who took up her case. She is teaming with the organisation that helped her to save others as an activist sort of. Her ordeals in Minnesota, which is among 13 states with the highest rate of human and sex trafficking in America, convinces her there are still many women like her holed up in confinements and deprivations.

The state first acquired this unenviable reputation in 2007 when 25 traffickers were arrested in a Minneapolis prostitution raid. Investigations revealed the Minneapolis house was providing sex to 60 men a day. Minnesota has a high rate of human trafficking partly because it has a long border with Canada; it also has a couple of large immigrant communities that can easily conceal human-trafficking activities, social workers say.

Bukola says, ". I am speaking out to help other victims of human trafficking and domestic abuse because I did not know that there was help. I don’t want to see a woman or child die. The same message goes to men who have been trafficked into the US and suffering in the hands of their traffickers. There is help out there and all they need to do is to make a phone call to be free from slavery and torture."

Civil organisations are already offering support to victims like Bukola. Their efforts are supported by the US authorities. Last month, the federal government’s U.S. Health and Human Services Department awarded $100,000 to St. Paul-based victim advocacy group Civil Society.

Linda Miller, an attorney and Civil Society’s executive director, said the money will be sent to small non profits that identify victims of human trafficking and try to get them to seek help. "Though it is not enough, we are grateful for what we have received," he was quoted to have said.

But Bukola is up for a big comeback after the great setback. After a series of rehabilitation efforts, she now has her braiding hair business in Anoka from which she cares for her son and she is trying to regain her footing."I need to stand on my feet and balance before I take the next step," she says.

That next move has to do with her first love-writing. Bukola, 32, still has journalism running in her blood. Not when she even has a gripping story to tell the world. "I hope to help others by using my experience and story. I have written a book on my experiences and now looking for a publisher so that everyone, including health practitioners, victims, law enforcement agencies, international organisations, human rights organisations and other relevant bodies can utilise it as a tool of rescue for victims of human trafficking and domestic abuse, most especially human trafficking." She also hopes to return to journalism some day.

But where is her husband? "I don’t know anything about him. I am doing fine and my son’s health has improved greatly she replied".

http://thenationonlineng.net/web/articles/9236/1/Escape-from-American-hell/Page1.html

Sounds like tales by moonlight to me, i dont believe this story.

ayomifull:

Sounds like tales by moonlight to me, i dont believe this story.

it's very possible.
some men r animals.

I'm not saying naija men are saints, but I'll take this story with a grain of salt. Too many commas.


the woman looks familiar self.

serves her right for marrying a man that she didnt know, may it be a warning to all. she is lucky, she could have ended up with a serial maniac who would have beaten her to death.
what was she expecting?!