Association Agaisnt Women Export

News

AAWE empowers women

June 21, 2010
(Nigerian Observer)

BENIN CITY-The Association Against Women Export (AAWE) has given out Loan worth over N400, 000.00 to indigent women in Edo State to economically empower them.

Speaking on behalf of the founder of Association Against Women Export, Dr Rose Okosun, Mrs. Phillippa Akpata stated that the non-governmental organization was formed with the sole aim of helping women to realize their economic potentials.

She urged the beneficiaries of the loan to use the proceeds from the business to be set up by them to assist their children to get quality education, saying that as mothers and women, the education of their children especially the girl child is a grave responsibility that is bestowed on them.

The founder of the non-governmental organization pointed out further that the weapon to effectively combat the ugly trend of human trafficking which ultimately metamorphoses into prostitution in foreign lands is lack of formal education.

She challenged the mothers to pay adequate attention to the movements of their daughters and to be very close to them, pointing out that with such an intimate relationship between the mother and the child could yield positive result.

She disclosed further that unsuspecting young girls been lured into prostitution in Italy and other major cities of the world with a promise of lucrative jobs abroad.

Dr. Rose Okosun appealed to the women to put the loan into their existing business to shore up their capital base or to start off a new business all-together, advising against diverting the money into unproductive ventures.

She informed the beneficiaries of the loan that a monitoring team will from time to time visit their business to access their progress and advised them to keep to the terms of the agreement.

It was revealed at the forum that two previous beneficiaries of the loan programme whose stores were burnt at Agbado market have had their loan written-off by the founder of the Association, Dr Rose Okosun and a new loan given them.

Stories from London and region paint a frightening picture.
Human trafficking stuns audience

January 31, 2008
Jennifer O'Brien
Sun Media

They are sex trade workers who dance under duress or farm workers crammed onto farmhouse floors at night -- this region's illustration of human trafficking.

And their plight is a frightening picture, speakers at a University of Western Ontario conference said yesterday (Jan. 30).

"This is happening in London," said Patricia Howe of the London & Area Anti Trafficking Committee. "We are talking about extreme exploitation here... desperate people who are controlled by underground middlemen."

Speaking between presentations at UWO's Human Trafficking Spotlight, Howe would later take the stage and stun many with what the two-year-old committee has found.

Howe said she has met several exotic dancers from Eastern Europe with a similar tale.

"The story starts with poverty... and a recruiter shows up," she said.

Women may be told they will be stripping in Canada, but that they can return shortly, once they make money for their families.

Instead, handlers confiscate their passports and say they must "buy" them back at a ridiculous cost. They often are forced into prostitution, she said.

"Don't kid yourself," said Megan Walker, head of the London Abused Women Centre. "There are women in this community here under false pretenses."

Walker met a "handful" after a large police bust diverted sex trade workers to her agency for counselling.

"Some women who reported to us asked if we could help others get out of the industry," she said. The agency referred women to a lawyer and offered shelter and counselling.

The sex trade worker situation is one local example of international human trafficking, but not the only one, said Howe, who visited a barn in this region where Southeast Asian workers sleep 11 to a room on mattresses on a farmhouse floor. Some are paid $7 a day, she said.

"It's unliveable," she said. Another problem is, Canadian laws do not help most victims. "Canada does not offer protection.

But the case isn't simple for police agencies just getting familiar with fairly new human trafficking laws, said Marty Van Doren, a former RCMP officer, now the force's Human Trafficking Awareness co-ordinator.

Van Doren stressed police intentions to protect victims of human trafficking, and urged reporting such cases.

But Howe said advocates "hesitate to do so." Asked why police have a reputation for deporting the victims, Van Doren said, "It's not clear cut.

"It's touchy. Some people are here illegally and from a law enforcement perspective, that is a difficult situation."

Van Doren also showed compelling pictures of young child labourers overseas.

"If you are wearing counterfeit goods, like a (knockoff) Adidas shirt, know that they were probably made in a sweatshop in a Third World country," said Van Doren, imploring people to think about the social cost of what they buy.

Jennifer O'Brien is a Free Press multiculturalism reporter.