By Kingsley Mba

Poverty has been identified as one of the major causes of human trafficking, as families who find it difficult to make ends meet resort to sending their children away to live with others they feel have the means to give the children access to a better life. Ironically, overtimes some of these children end up in wrong hands who either use them for economic exploitations, abuse them sexually, or subject them to torture and other inhuman treatments.

However, the efforts to tackle the menace of human trafficking received another boost with the interventions recently launched by MeCAHT in partnership with ROOST foundation. The partnership has provided women from Ketti community, Kabusa Village in F.C.T Abuja with enlightenment training on human trafficking, human rights, menstrual hygiene as well as financial grants to boost their business.

At an interactive session with some of the women, The Executive Director Roost Foundation, Dame Julie Okah-Donli while commending the women for applying the lessons learnt from the training urged them to also extend the knowledge to other women so as to enable them know the negative implications of allowing their children to be taken away as these children most times get trafficked for economic and sexual exploitations.

Okah-Donli during the session, advised the women to pay close attention to neighbors and relatives who acting under the guise of caring for their female children could be abusing the them sexual, noting that it is wrong for adult males to touch their female children inappropriately, call them into their houses or send them on unclear errands as these are some of the ways sexual predators gain access to vulnerable children.

She also harped on the need to ensure abused children get justice as this would help them handle the trauma better , knowing that Justice is served and the culprit equally get punished. "Some families choose to cover up when their female children are abused, thereby denying the victims justice, some even after knowing their husbands are the abusers shield their husbands and allow the children to suffer the pain and trauma all through their lives."

On the issue of nurturing a child, Dame Okah-Donli said no child shall be made to feel inferior to another, "some of you are in the habit of giving your male children preferential treatment over their female siblings. This is totally wrong as the female child would end up feeling unloved and this could expose her to start seeking love outside." Some of the poorly raised children , she stated later in life become damaged and a threat to their families, reason, you hear stories about children killing their parents.

MeCHAT a media driven faith based organization working to reduce the incidence of human trafficking among vulnerable people in collaboration with ROOST foundation, an organization committed to finding a lasting solution to stem the tide of irregular migration, human trafficking, sexual and gender based violence, stated that this intervention is focusing on people living at the local communities or grassroot level, who are usually the most affected when it comes to human trafficking, and sexual and gender based violence.

Dame Okah-Donli said the programme is an advocacy and empowerment campaign which is targeted at the grassroot people."The advocacy is not only merely talking about human trafficking, human rights and menstrual hygiene but empowering the women to be able to cater to the family needs." She added. According to her the intervention provides financial support to the women to boost their trade and with this, they can provide for their children and would not allow them be taken away by traffickers as a result of poverty.

Some of the beneficiaries who spoke during the session, appreciated the organizations for the support, noting that the training was very helpful.

"The training is quite helpful, we learnt some helpful tips to prevent our children from being trafficked and on menstrual hygiene. Before we were using old clothes as pads during menstruation but now we use normal pads and reusable pads," Said Murna Yusuf.

Mrs Yusuf believes if other women also know about all the things they have learnt, it would help to reduce the incidence of human trafficking .

She however called on relevant authorities to come to their their aid, by equiping the only health centre in the community with medical supplies and more staff to be able to address their medical needs. She pointed out that the health centre still lack the capacity to address their medical needs or handle emergencies. "Even some times to get malaria and typhoid medicines from the health centre is a problem," she lamented.