January 26, 2012: Every year hundreds of thousands of children, themselves or their parents lured by promises of a better life, are spirited across Central African borders, forced into lives of grinding street labor or sex slavery.
Child trafficking generally flows one way -- from poorer nations, where families cannot offer their children much of a future -- to better-off oil-producing countries like Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of Congo.
According to IRIN news service, the exploitation of child labor is growing, as highlighted at a recent conference in the Republic of Congo. Held in that nation’s city of Pointe Noire, the gathering focused on ways to prevent child trafficking. Attendees included representatives from Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon.
Exploitation of Children a Very Real Problem
"Trafficking in children is real,” Mélanie Mbadinga Matsanga, Gabon’s social affairs director-general, told IRIN. “Gabon, for example, is considered an El Dorado and draws a lot of West African immigrants who traffic children.”
Because of its relative prosperity within Africa, Gabon is a key destination and transit country for trafficked children and women, according to the U.S. Department of State. Both are subject to forced labor and sex work.
A dearth of data hinders media coverage of child trafficking. Accurate counts of affected children do not exist. “The parents in the countries of origin do not even know what happens to their children in the countries of destination,” Marianne Flach, UNICEF’s representative in the Congo, told IRIN.
Traffickers Aim to Get Rich Quick
People who traffic children are out to make fast money. In places like Cameroon, where parents are becoming more aware of the abuse perpetrated by traffickers, middlemen are now kidnapping children. In that country, traffickers often target multiple boys and girls from one rural family.
In the DRC armed groups and the swelling oil and mineral industries exacerbate child exploitation by creating an environment where large profits are made by forcing children to become cheap fighters, laborers, and sex slaves.
Experts at the conference agreed that government enforcement of anti-trafficking laws in the relevant countries is weak. Despite the arrest of suspected offenders in Gabon over the past decade, none were convicted, according to the U.S. State Department.