Ignorance, education, ignorance; Africa’s problem mantra.What is needed and what is the reality? No wonder the Guinean woman I quoted last week said Ebola (the killer virus) was not caused by eating “bush meat” – but by God. God, forever. The uneducated masses of the world always point fingers and accuse a long tunnel of empty skies. God. We have endless bus and boat accidents because of God. Our life span averages 40 years because God wishes. The African continent is not developing because of God. Or rather the Devil is making love to Africa. Crazy love. Black and cursed. Is that why certain Africans like to bleach their skins?
Let us be a bit more specific.
I was checking out this Kenyan blog. The lady blogger writes well. No “copied and pasted” material and a hundred adverts. Yes you can scroll down the blog. It does not take you twenty minutes to read a page. The African Traveller, she calls herself. No pictures, no lipstick or fake hair and extensions. She is exasperated, frustrated and concerned about her fellow sisters:
Sex traffickers
“African women always fall prey to sex traffickers. Why? Most African countries are poor countries and some people cannot afford the cost of living… they end up leaving their countries in search of greener pastures…Women take the most care of the children and being the loving parents they are, they go overboard in order to provide for them. There are limited job opportunities and the competition is very high; so the jobs available are given to people who are even overqualified as the number of educated people is higher than the jobs available. The less educated people either get low paying shoddy jobs or no jobs at all. These factors and others lead to these ladies emigrating from their countries to other ones where prostitution is more paying.”
That is a very, very long quote, my apologies; but it suits today’s piece. Lack of education and its cousin, ignorance, are making our women run amok, fly to sell and demean themselves. It would have been easy if these females had decided to become sex workers. By choice. But this is forced, violent, sex labour.
Listen.
Currently China and Malaysia (where the news of the plane disappearance has focused) stand tall in the trade of women sex trafficking. The said Kenyan blogger spills details. Women from Uganda, Kenya and South Africa are lured to beauty salon jobs. Their travel fare is paid for. Total, $20,000. Upon arrival, things change. Dramatically. New country. New culture. Unfamiliarity. Can’t speak the language. Knows nobody. Passports confiscated. Locked into hotel rooms. Forced sex. Clients are a mixture of murderers, psychos, tourists and good guys, an African traveller (who has been there) reports.
To “tame” them, Nigerian men are allegedly used. Any girl refusing is raped, beaten up and sometimes killed. Or commits suicide. One Ugandan girl jumped from the fourth floor in Taman Kosas, Malaysia. She could not take it anymore. She died.
A 20,000-dollar ticket is paid back that way.
When looked from the perspective of a desperate human being, money, (yes, bloody money!) is God. In one night a girl may earn 400 dollars; a month’s wages were she to work in a shop or beauty salon.
This is what attracted a group of Tanzanian girls to China recently. Like a bunch of hungry doves and chickens and peacocks, they flocked to Macau. Tragedy after tragedy has been striking them from day one. They have to obey “boss ladies” to start with. Know what that means?
In her blog, London’s Jestina George has recordings of these so-called Boss Ladies. Older women who have settled in Chinese towns like Macau and Dunhuang. Assisted with Nigerian toughies they run the scene. The innocent Swahili speakers have to do as they are told or perish. Total hell. Sex Gestapo. Yes, Miss Habiba Yusufu Ali Abdallah is a latest casualty. It is claimed in one of the recordings, through a witness (too fearful to say her name) that Habiba was raped, beaten, her kidney ripped out then murdered. The witness swears she was part of the group that went to identify the deceased’s body. Scarred, scared, traumatised, her voice is still live on Jestina’s blog.
Jestina George has been liaising with the International Organisation For Migration (IMO) to try and help the desperate women. There is a lesson to be learnt, she warns. The women are lured to work in beauty salons. (Lies). No written contracts. (Cheating). Confiscation of documents including passports. They do not know this is human trafficking. (Ignorance). How would you know sex trafficking if you are not educated and the majority of African women are not?
Being cheated
“Parents and families should educate their children that they are being cheated,” Jestina pleads in Swahili. How many shall read the blogs of Jestina George or The African Traveller? How many read or can access computers, anyway?
Education.
That word.
