Child trafficking and World Cup football

Congestion in Johannesburg is bad enough with the already 3 million or so people who ‘belong’ here – imagine a stampede of football fans.

 

But seriously the exposure would be good for South Africa – but what about the negative sides of the game?

 

South Africa, as I’m sure you know has a huge migrant problem. Africans from all over the continent make their way here in search of scarce jobs – and 2010 is seen as an opportunity.

 

But a worrying trend is the number of children coming on their own – crossing the border into SA to look for work.

 

And no doubt aid agencies are concerned these children are being exploited used for cheap labour – on farms or as domestic workers.

 

A more disturbing worry for me are the girls are being sold into sex syndicates – to ‘service’ the influx football fans and visitors to South Africa.

 

Imagine – a child can be sold for 300 US dollars to a pimp! How disgusting!

 

I’ve heard some people ask, “well why are these children even coming on their own? Surely they are asking for trouble. Where are their parents?”

 

The truth is many don’t have parents, there is so much poverty in their home countries and that naive sense of invincibility we all had as children plays a part too.

 

Remember how as children we thought we could do anything?

 

So these children some as young as 5 walk to South Africa, sneak in through holes along the border fence looking for a better life - bound together by a grown up desire to send money to their families back home.

 

I saw the fence myself for the first time after reading so many stories about border jumpers – and really – what kind of security is that?

 

At first glance it looks impressive – a mish-mash of barbed wire that seems impossible to get through.

 

Buy look closely and you will see every few metres holes cut into it by border jumpers.

 

Security along the fence on the Zimbabwe/South Africa border really isn’t brilliant. I was there for about two hours and one border patrol car drove past me. They didn’t even stop to ask me what on earth I was doing there!

 

They just waved at me. Maybe I didn’t look like a border jumper – but then what does a border jumper from Zimbabwe look like?

 

I saw a lot of children clearly at home with ‘playing’ along the fence. This is their home, this is how they came into South Africa and they help other border jumpers get into too by showing them the route they took.

 

Anyway back to the point of this blog – children being lured or sold into the sex industry.

 

The girls are often picked up in or around the border fence area by what we call ‘magumagumas’ in Shona – a Zimbabwean language. These are conmen or women who attack border jumpers as they cross over. Sometimes it’s just stealing money or belongings but more and more women and children are being raped – or young girls are being lured into the sex trade industry.

 

And it seems the police can do nothing much to stop it.

 

South Africa is spending 200 million US dollars on security ahead of the World Cup – surely some of that can go towards protecting migrant children from the snares of human traffickers?

 

Maybe I’m being naive – maybe pulling of a fanstastic World Cup is more important than ensuring the safety of thousands of child migrants thought to be in South Africa right now!