NAPTIP warns parents against aiding trafficking

The Director-General, National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, Dame Julie OkahDonli, has warned parents against mounting undue pressure on their children to embark on irregular migration for the purpose of sexual or labour exploitation.

Okah-Donli lamented that Nigeria was losing millions of her promising and brilliant workforce to irregular migration-induced carnage with the attendant consequences on the economy of the nation stated this at Ekpoma, Esan West Local government Area of Edo State while addressing stakeholders.

“I am pained in my heart as a mother each time I recall the plight of our youths on the scotching unfriendly Sahara Desert and on the dangerous Mediterranean Sea in their bid to get to Europe for the so-called greener pasture. Of more serious concern are those that have been sold off like slaves and are trapped in some of the African countries.

“The present economic situation is a global phenomenon and as such, Nigeria is even greener than some of the European countries now. Let us advice our youths to look inward and make the best of some of the potentials around them. They should key into the various social intervention programmes of the present administration and better their lives.

“We cannot afford to continue to lose greater number of our youths in tragedies associated with irregular migration, this just has to stop.

“While a few of them are lucky to escape, or rescued, others may not be so lucky to tell the story. Painfully, some of them at the moment are permanently incapacitated having contracted some strange diseases. This is why efforts must be made to ensure that we observe, ask question and do something to save the lives of these youths,” she said.