LGUs support drive vs human trafficking

by Babel-Fish | October 4, 2008 at 07:26 pm

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Many a young girl has been fooled into believing a job awaits her overseas normally its a suposed job in entertainment, hotel or bar work. The gloss soon washes away as soon as they arrive at the destination and her passport is taken away by the agent. Then she normally has no option other than prostitution.

It's a very sad affair, I often warn women and girls that say they are going overseas to work and they have no real skills or qualification other than having good looks. The problem is that even registered employment agencies are involved in this form of human trafficking. It's normally those that are in poverty, that want to walk paths of gold in foriegn lands so as to send money home to their families and save to buy land and build a nice house that fall for this wicked trick. Then there are those that endup what could be reguarded as slave labor.

The need of some to work overseas has also has another problem especially when they are married. Many a family has split up by partners being unfaithful or the partner at home spend everything on their own pleasures. A filipina friend of mine went to Hong Kong to work when she came home she found her husband spent everything on drugs, later he was jailed for selling drugs. But of course the worst thing is this human traficking.

SOME local government units (LGUs) in Negros Oriental responded to calls for intensifying the campaign against human trafficking by way of passing local laws and ordinances.

Of the ten LGUs identified as human trafficking hotspots in the region, only three have so far passed local ordinances. These are the towns of Sibulan, Zamboanguita and Amlan.

The three towns have adopted measures to prevent and suppress recruitment of possible victims, including children and women.

The other hotspots or major recruitment grounds for victims are Bayawan City, Sta. Catalina, Siaton, Dumaguete City, San Jose, Mabinay and Guihulngan.

According to the leaders of these towns, they are now in the process of drafting the ordinance after a series of orientation-briefings initiated by the Provincial Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking in Person (Piacat) to the Municipal Council and City Council.

Meanwhile, to speed up the formations of Municipality Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking in Person (Miacat), Sibulan town Mayor Antonio Renacia issued an Executive Order organizing such structure and mechanism not only to monitor the activities but also to plan and implement laws with regards to trafficking in persons.

The Piacat, on the other hand, has intensified its advocacy and information campaign on anti-trafficking in the towns of Basay, Vallehermoso, Ayungon, Tayasan, Bindoy, La Liberad, and Jimalalud.

Piacat explained that considering Negros Oriental serving as transit area and at the center of development, commerce, and transportation, it is a fertile recruitment ground for traffickers.

Statistics from a 2001 United Nations report, Cecile Hoffman of Gender Watch Against Violence and Exploitation (GWave) bared that 4 million persons were trafficked across borders each year of which 80 percent are women.