From Fred Ezeh, Abuja

The Federal Government of Nigeria has renewed its commitment to the fight against human trafficking which it described as a big threat to its human capital and overall economic development.

Vice President Prof Yemi Osinbajo gave the commitment in Abuja, on Monday, at the grand finale of the one-week event to mark the 2022 world day against human trafficking with the theme “use and abuse of technology”.

The vice president, who was represented by the Deputy Chief of Staff to the President, Adeola Ipaye, appreciated the efforts and achievements of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) in the fight against human trafficking and solicited the increased support and collaboration of the partners and stakeholders in the fight against human trafficking.

He disclosed that Federal Government has developed policies, namely, the National Action Plan on Human Trafficking 2022 to 2026, the National Policy for Protection and Assistance to Victims of Trafficking in Persons, and the Protocol for Identification, Safe Return and Reintegration of Trafficked Persons, that would help NAPTIP and its local and international partners to achieve more success in the fight against human trafficking.

He said: “These policy documents would continue to set the agenda on important conversations and possibly streamline activities that would interrupt and reverse activities of human traffickers.

“Federal Government deliberately gave the larger opportunity of its social intervention programmes to women and young persons in order to reduce their vulnerability to the antics of human traffickers.”

Related News

Related: Human Trafficking: Alarm raised over online recruitment of victims 

Director General of NAPTIP Dr Fatima Waziri-Azi, in her remarks, said the Agency has recently observed an increase in fake job advertorials and fake scholarships via social media platforms through which traffickers recruit unsuspecting victims and control them.

She said: “for instance, besides oath taking, they make nude videos of victims and
threaten to share the images online if victims do not cooperate. While technology is frequently misused to facilitate trafficking in persons, its positive use helps in combating trafficking and support anti-trafficking work such as aiding investigations that in turn enhances prosecutions, and scaling awareness campaigns.”

She, however, disclosed that a working partnership has been secured with the Palace of Oba of Benin, and a joint task force has been established to strengthen interventions at the community level.

She confirmed that the joint task force has begun its work by progressively conducting awareness creation and community dialogues in three endemic local
government areas of Edo State (name withheld) to scale awareness against human trafficking, smuggling of migrants and irregular migration.

“Nine communities in the three endemic local government areas would be covered in the first phase of this project. We have begun a nationwide establishment of trafficking in persons and violence against person vanguard across the 110 Federal Government Colleges.

“This is intended to increase the capacity of students to identify and report incidences of human trafficking and sexual and gender-based violence, in and outside schools, and raise a generation of young people empowered to advocate against these crimes and promote safe migration as an option rather than irregular migration. We can do a lot of prevention work just by
opening their eyes to the problem.”

Meanwhile, the United States and British Ambassadors to Nigeria, Mary Beth Leonard and Catriona Laing, respectively, in their speeches frowned at the increasing activities of human traffickers especially online and pledged support to NAPTIP and its partners to ensure that more success is recorded in the fight against human trafficking.