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NAPTIP cautions parents against becoming victims of human traffickers at yuletide

By Collins Olayinka, Abuja
25 December 2018   |   4:20 am
The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking In Persons (NAPTIP) has cautioned parents and guardians against falling for better life in foreign countries to lure their wards out of the country.

Dame Julie Okah-Donli, Director-General, National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP).

The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking In Persons (NAPTIP) has cautioned parents and guardians against falling for better life in foreign countries to lure their wards out of the country.

The Director-General of NAPTIP, Julie Okah-Donli, explained that human traffickers who have amassed illicit wealth use the yuletide period to display them as a symbol of success staying abroad to attract unsuspecting victims.

The Director General made the remark while reacting to the news of the conviction of a human trafficker by a State High Court sitting in Enugu. Odinkenma Promise Adumike, from Enugu state, was arrested and charged by NAPTIP on a two-count charge of organising foreign travel, which promotes prostitution, contrary to sections 15 and 18 of the Trafficking In Persons (Prohibition) Enforcement and Administration Act, 2015. She was accused of trafficking an eighteen years old girl, also from Enugu State, to Libya for sexual exploitation.

The presiding judge, Justice C.C. Ani, having listened to the counsels and the evidences tendered, found the accused guilty, and sentenced her to seven years imprisonment and a fine of one million naira.

The NAPTIP boss enjoined Nigerian youths to shun the entreaties of human traffickers and migrants smugglers who come back at the end of the year to flaunt their ill-gotten wealth, to entice victims.

According to the NAPTIP boss: “For one human trafficker, there are tens to hundreds of victims living in exploitative situations”. She further called on parents not to be deceived by offers to take their children to the cities or abroad without legal travel documents, by migrants’ smugglers as such journeys often end up in tales of woes.”

Julie Okah-Donli used the opportunity of the 2018 International Migrants’ Day to equally urge Nigerian youths to key into the empowerment schemes already put in place by the Federal Government in order to avoid illegal migration and the accompanying tales of sorrow. She called on world leaders and governments of various countries to treat migrants with respect and dignity, bearing in mind that migration is a natural phenomenon and a driver of economic activities.

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