The data
Every case on SlaveryMap, drawn from public sources and shown with its location deliberately generalized to protect survivors.
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Ghana GH
Only hours after their rescue, traffickers reclaimed most of these victims by posing as boyfriends and family members at the government’s shelter, according to local observers. More information: http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2008/105379.htm
Ghana GH
The Adzimu shrine priestess and owners admittedly practice a form of slavery commonly called trokosi, but called customary or ritual servitude by the Ghana government. It is a combination of sexual and labor slavery and somewhat akind to servile marriage, because the girls are thought to be married to the gods of the shrine and sex with the priest or elders of the shrine is considered sacred because his (their) genitals are devoted to the deities of the shrine. About 16 girls are believed to be in bondage within the confines of the shrine, with about 600 living outside the shrine in involuntary subservience to the shrine. This practice permits girls to live outside the shrine under certain strict conditions and controls, including payment of a very expensive sacrifice at the annual festival. Adzimu is a head shrine having jurisdiction over three others.
Ghana GH
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. Two NGO's, Every Child Ministries Ghana and Fetish Slaves Liberation Movement negotiated with the Aklidokpo 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 its trokosi slaves on January 22, 2004. The liberation was a public event in which the shrine freed the slaves and their children and agreed to end the practice of ritual servitude in that place. In this case a woman of unknown age was freed having served as a slave in the shrine since she was too young to remember. When she came she was too young to act on her own and was cared for by older slaves until she grew older. She was the third girl enslaved at the shrine in an attempt to atone for the same misdeed. When the priest tried to rape her, she ran away but was soon caught. Again she tried to run away later, but always ended up back at the shrine. She still struggles with fear, feeling that the god of the shrine may kill her at any time and for any reason.