Domestic Servitude2005
Togo TG
The victim's father was approached by a woman who offered the daughter a job caring for a child for a family in Lome. She did not mention payment, but the father agreed anyway, sending the daughter with the woman in a taxi to the city. For four months she lived and worked in a house in Lome cleaning, washing, and selling juice on the street in addition to watching the child. If she did not sell enough juice or did not finish all her housework, she was beaten with a stick or locked out of the house to sleep outside. She escaped that house and met some children on the street who spoke her language. They took her a woman who said she needed help selling her rice. The victim agreed, but after four days realized she was being abused there, too. She told her employer she wanted to leave and was brought to the police station. They informed a local NGO and arranged for her to go to the Oasis Center at Lome. After 7 days at the center, her father found her there and took her back home to Aouda.
Domestic Servitude2005
Togo TG
A local "waga" or trafficker of children from her home area contacted the victim whose family she knew to be poor offering her a job in Nigeria. The victim, hoping for the best, did not inquire as to what kind of job she would receive or the conditions of work. The young girl was handed to an intermediary who accompanied the victim and other girls by bus on a winding three-day trip over back roads to Agegai, Nigeria. All along the way they picked up other victims. The victims had no money to pay for their trip, so agreed to work for six months to pay off the cost of their voyage. They had nothing to eat along the way. Meanwhile, the family at home was frantically searching for their daughter. In Agegai, Nigeria, 15 girls from Togo and Benin lived and worked in a filthy kitchen where they prepared food to sell on the streets to local workers. They had quotas to sell and were forced to prostitute themselves if they did not meet the quotas. The victim began to suffer from dysentery and suspected she was pregnant. Then the supervisor threw a knife at her and cut her wrist deeply. She escaped, but alone on the streets she fell victim to another man who held her as a virtual prisoner for three months. Desperate, the victim stole some money and fled to the road station, where she begged a driver to take her home. She arrived home six months' pregnant, penniless, sick, and owing the driver for the trip. She was not welcomed by her family. The grandparents finally tok her in.
Domestic Servitude2005
Togo TG
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.