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Read, Debate: Engage.
| topic: | Human Trafficking |
|---|---|
| located: | Lesotho, South Africa, USA |
| editor: | Bob Koigi |
Despite harrowing accounts of Basotho women, children and men being subjected to modern day servitude, torture, exploitation by sex traffickers and detention in prison-like conditions, the government of Lesotho has done little to crack the whip on the offenders and continues to pay lip service to its commitment to protect human trafficking victims and uphold the dignity of human life.
At home and abroad, there has been numerous documented stories of children forced to work as animal herders under tough conditions, others forcefully taken to urban areas and forced into sex trafficking.
Men and women who migrate to neighbouring countries like South Africa to work in agriculture and mining fields are subjected to tough working conditions without pay before being handed over to South African authorities for deportation, as the traffickers devise ways of not paying them for work done.
The media has been awash with stories of Basotho men who have died for being deprived of oxygen in dilapidated mines. The well-oiled syndicate involves Basotho, South Africans and Chinese among other nationalities.
The government has been accused of not pursuing the traffickers and, sometimes, letting them off the hook. For the ninth year in a row, it has failed to commit funds to protect victims of trafficking and has scaled down on law enforcement efforts with its human trafficking laws - in violation of international law. It also failed to investigate and pursue possible trafficking cases for a second year, and haven’t had any successful conviction of traffickers in a fourth consecutive year.
The United States expressed concern about the lack of commitment by the government of Lesotho to tackling these egregious human rights abuses, and placed the country in Tier 3 - the lowest tier in the US State Department's Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report for 2020.
While there have been some steps in tackling the scourge, like the introduction of a law to empower the police to apprehend traffickers and devising mechanisms to protect victims of trafficking, there hasn’t been any tangible results in translating the legislation into action.
Heads must roll, perpetrators must be brought to book and the government must embrace the principles of accountability and transparency in word and deed if Lesotho is to restore respect among the community of nations.
Image: Jeroen van Duijn.
