It is agaisnt this backdrop that the National Agency Against Trafficiking In Persons (NAATIP), recently engaged the community of Kartong, a border community on isues relating to trafficking of persons.
The event, which acctracted students, forms part of the agency’s regular advocacy to amplify their calls against human trafficking, targeting communities especilly those at the border line.
Welcoming the gatheirng, Abubacarr Kanteh, councillor of Kartong Ward, underscored the importace of the gathering higlighting the growing nature of human trafficking in the country.
He revealed that some of the people who fall victim to this menace are promised better highly paid jobs in the Middle East by their agents only to find themselves trapped in a siutation that leaves much to bbe desired.
The ugly act, he added, affects almost all sectors, thus stressing the need for all to rally behind and stay united to combat the menace.
Saihou Cham, an investigator at NAATIP, expressed delight at the number of students, who turned up at the event.
The act, he added, is part of a broader transnatiotional crime opertaed by powerful kartels, saying it is another form of modern day slavery.
While highliting the deplorabe nature of human trafficking on women and children, Cham reminded that his agency is under the Minsitry of Justice empowered by the 2007 Act to investigate, create awareness and prosecute all offences related to human trafficking in the country.
Tijan Faal, deputy Head of Investigations at NAATIP, elaborated on some real life stories involving people who were duped into this act by their agents and managed to escape, expresing the Ministry’s resolve to combat all forms of human trafficking in the country.
He also remided communities of their role in ending this modern day slavery, adding that everyone has a role to play as human trafficking violates the fundamental rights of people.
"The three main components involve in the practice are: the act, means and the purpose. Therefore, it is everybody’s business to combat human trafficking in the country. We need to raise more awareness about it."
Faal described human trafficking as a serious problem affecting the plight of women and children, saying most of the victims are forced into all kinds of human degrading conditions.
Similar sentisation was conducted at the Kartong crossing point targeting personelle of The Gambia Immigration Department and women fishmongers, as borderlines are mostly the spot used by traffickers before subjecting them to all kinds of maltreatement.
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