FREEDOM FIGHTER
A CHANCE REMARK ABOUT THE CONCENTRATION CAMPS OF NAZI GERMANY GAVE MARY MCSHARRY THE SPARK TO JOIN THE FIGHT AGAINST MODERN DAY SLAVERY, SHE TELLS SORCHA CROWLEY
I DON’T EVER WANT TO HAVE TO SAY TO MY CHILDREN THAT I DIDN’T KNOW IT WAS HAPPENING
LIVES have been saved by nosey neighbours. We all need to look around us more.” Mary McSharry, grandmother, mother and now modern day abolitionist, is taking on the human traffickers and she’s starting, like all charities, at home. She has taken it upon herself to set up in Sligo the Republic’s only branch of Invisible Traffick, a registered charity in the North of Ireland aiming to see the abolition of modern day slavery within our communities.
It’s a fact today that 154 years after Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in the US, humans are still enslaving other humans, in Ireland and across the planet.
The statistics are staggering: there are more slaves alive today than during the 350 year slave trade - anything between 30- 40 million people held in captivity.
It’s now second only to drugs and is the fastest growing criminal activity worldwide.
While most of us would feel paralysed by such figures, Mary has chosen action instead of apathy: “I’m a modern day abolitionist, a fighting Momma!”
She’s giving up her full- time job in September to devote all her energies to Invisible Traffick.
“It’s such a huge massive problem that can either paralyse you or get you thinking what if my small little bit can make a difference and if everybody did a small bit it would make a difference,” she tells The Sligo Champion.
The first ever cases of human trafficking in Sligo are currently before the courts. Mary is watching them closely.
“It’s just so hard to identify human trafficking. The legislation is so brand new. It’s very difficult to make the charge stick,” she says.
Ireland is an easy target for the traffickers because the legislation is all so new.
“In England they’ve made the legislation stronger but I know Ireland will follow suit. Changing legislation to get rid of the demand is where we’re at and that’s one of the things that helps reduce human trafficking,” says the Belfast native native. Human trafficking boils down to the buying and selling of people. “Low risk, high profit - that’s what brings the criminals into the whole thing,” says Mary.
The promise of a good job in a western country is made, travel arranged and then precious identity documents are taken from unsuspecting victims at the airport.
“You’re now in a country where you probably don’t even know the language, taken to a place and most often beaten, raped and they are so fearful they are afraid to escape,” she explains.
Their family at home are threatened with harm if they try to escape.
Sexual exploitation is the highest, the average age being 12 years.
“In all honesty, there’s cases much younger than that, the younger they are the higher the price,” says Mary.
Mary was flicking through the channels on TV one night about three years ago and came across a documentary about modern day slavery.
“I thought this can’t be happening in the 21st century. I looked into Asia and was just horrified at what is happening because it is so massive out there. Once I got over the shock, I wondered what I could do.
Then she realised it’s going on here in Ireland, almost entirely under the radar.
“That really shocked me. In our own country and county. I felt unless I did something I would burst,” she says.
But it was an episode in her childhood that really resonated with Mary throughout her entire life and came back to haunt her when faced with the facts of human trafficking.
She had a pen pal in Germany in 1969. For a school history project, she asked her pen pal if she knew anyone who lived in Germany during World War Two. She wrote back to Mary and said she did - her Granny.
Mary asked her to put a few questions to her Granny and record the answers on a tape and send it back to her.
To a 12 year old’s ears in Belfast in 1969, one answer stood out.
“I asked my friend to ask her Granny how she felt and thought about the concentration camps. Her words were: “We didn’t know they existed. We didn’t know it was happening.”
“That idea struck me way back then, that some atrocity was going on around you and years later you discover it. Those words got to me,” recalls Mary.
“When I discovered that human trafficking was happening, I thought I don’t ever want to have to say to my children or grandchildren that I didn’t know what was happening. “That’s how it got in me,” she says. “Instead of being paralysed by it, I thought about what I could do to make a difference in my patch, where I’m living,” she says. She has the full backing of her husband Damien, five children and four grandchildren.
Invisible Traffick in the UK have opened up a Safe House for victims of human trafficking, while up North, they launched a new helpline in March.
Mary is aiming first to increase education and awareness about the issue in schools around Sligo.
She is hoping to be allowed into Second Level Schools to present a workshop to Transition Year students. She also has an education pack for Primary Level 6th class pupils ready to print, once she has funding in place.
She’s meeting with local public representatives and MEP Marian Harkin and was also invited to the Department of Justice Round Table discussions on the issue this year.
“In Sligo we’re starting off with education and awareness with the hope of moving into whatever the need is, be it a helpline or a safe house down the road,” she says.
She’s urging people to just be vigilant about unusual activity at houses in their neighbour, to be a nosey neighbour.
“If you see something odd, don’t approach people, just get as much information as you can and then ring Sligo Gardaí,” she says.
For more information on how you can help prevent human trafficking here go to invisibletraffick.org