NAPTIP Repatriates 13-Year-Old Trafficking Victim from Burkina Faso

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) in Ogun State has brought back a 13-year-old girl who was trafficked to Burkina Faso for sexual exploitation.

The teenager, who was learning tailoring, was reportedly taken out of Nigeria last year by her 26-year-old employer, Omotola Adedibu.

NAPTIP said the girl was exploited in Burkina Faso and forced into repeated sexual abuse as a way of repaying a debt of 1.3 million CFA francs to a woman identified as “Madam Sweet.”

The Ogun State Commander of NAPTIP, Abosede Jimoh, disclosed this while speaking with journalists during an anti-human trafficking awareness programme at Gateway Secondary School in Abeokuta.

Jimoh said the suspect, Adedibu, has been arrested and will soon be charged to court, while other accomplices are still being tracked.

She described the case as one of the agency’s recent breakthroughs and warned that human trafficking remains a serious problem in Ogun State.

According to her, the school sensitisation programme was organised to educate students, who are often targets of traffickers, on how to recognise and avoid trafficking tricks.

NAPTIP Director-General, Binta Bello, has also stressed the importance of involving young people in the fight against child trafficking. She was represented at the event by Jimoh, who also attended the inauguration of an Anti-Trafficking and Violence Against Persons Vanguard Club at another secondary school in the state.

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