Domestic ServitudeArchive 2008–2016

Domestic Servitude in Togo (2005)

A domestic servitude case from 2005 in Togo, Togo.

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Documented on the original SlaveryMap (2008–2016). We don’t have a verifiable source on file yet. Know one?

What happened

The victim was a girl who had completed primary school but was unable to go on to attend middle school because of lack of finances. A family friend presented them with the idea that she go to work in Lome. He said he knew someone who was looking for help in their boutique. The victim traveled to Lome with the friend, and the girl was introduced very briefly to her knew employer in Agbelapedo, a busy transit hub. The employer offered her the equivalent of $6 a month to care for her four children and the house and make tea to sell in the boutique, then help out there. However, she found that she was subjected to both verbal and physical abuse as well as food deprivation. She was fed only scraps, but often there was nothing left. In one instance, she was accused of stealing money and was severely beaten. It was eventually found in the son's pocket.

Response and intervention

Law enforcement was not informed. One day at the market the victim saw a friend and relayed an urgent message to her family to come and get her. Two weeks later, the mother arrived along with the family friend who arranged the deal. The employer was angry since they had not warned her of their coming, so she took all the victim's personal belongings. The family rescued the victim and returned home with her. Later she was able to get a seamstress apprenticeship and later financial aid in her village. Today she educates others about the dangers of child exploitation. ATPH Interview by CARE Togo and the Peace Corps

Nearby cases

All 12 in Togo →

Forced Criminality2005

Aflao Ghana, Togo, 2005

Togo TG

The practice of ritual or customary servitude was outlawed in Ghana in 1998, but the practical implementation of the law has fallen largely to NGO's who have facilitated the shrines in ending the practice. The NGO Every Child Ministries Ghana and negotiated with the Sovigbenor shrine and educated them as to the issues over a span of over a year, finally winning the approval of the shrine for the liberation of all 126 of its trokosi slaves on December 9, 2005. The liberation was a public event in which the shrine freed the slaves and agreed to end the practice of ritual servitude in that place. In this case a 37 year old woman was liberated who had been born in bondage to a trokosi. The practice of replacement demands that if a trokosi slave dies or runs away, she must be replaced by another girl from her family, so this child replaced her mother upon her death. Her story came out in the course of the liberation process. She was one of 126 women liberated from the Sovigbenor shrine.

Needs a sourceArchive 2008–2016

Sex Trafficking2008

Aflao, Ghana, Togo, 2008

Togo TG

The practice of ritual or customary servitude was outlawed in Ghana in 1998, but no one has ever been prosecuted under the law. Rather, the practical implementation of the law has fallen largely to NGO's who have facilitated the shrines in ending the practice. The NGO Every Child Ministries Ghana negotiated with the Sovigbenor shrine community and educated them as to the issues over a span of over a year, finally winning the approval of the shrine for the liberation of all 126 of its trokosi slaves on December 9, 2005. The liberation was a public event in which the shrine freed the slaves and agreed to end the practice of ritual servitude in that place. In this case a 79 year old woman was liberated who had been enslaved there since she was about one year old.

1 sourceArchive 2008–2016

Forced Criminality2010

Aflao, Ghana, Togo, 2010

Togo TG

The priest volunteered to free his shrine servants with the collaboration of Every Child Ministries after he became a Christian. The victim in this case was a 55 year old woman who was taken into the shrine "very young" by her father, but never knew the reason. Because of this she was never able to attend school.

Needs a sourceArchive 2008–2016