Human Trafficking in  [Togo]  [other countries]
Street Children in  [Togo]  [other countries]
Child Prostitution in  [Togo]  [other countries]
 

Child Prostitution

The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children

Togolese Republic (Togo)                                                 [ Country-by-Country Reports ]

The Togolese Republic is located in W Africa [map] and is bordered by the Gulf of Guinea (S), Ghana (W), Burkina Faso (N), and Benin (E).  Lomé is its capital and largest city.   Togo’s socio-political crisis in the early 1990s resulted in the suspension of nearly all foreign assistance.  This had a forceful impact on the social sectors.  Currently 39% of the school-age girls in the country are not enrolled or have dropped out of school, and the disparities in education are reflected in the very high gender gap that stands at 24%. . Of those girls who drop out of primary school, many end up as domestic workers or become the victims of child trafficking.

 

CAUTION:  The following links and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in Togo.  Some of these links may lead to websites that present allegations that are unsubstantiated, misleading or even false.   No attempt has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content.

National Plan of Action

U.S. Dept of Labor Bureau of International Labor Affairs

INCIDENCE AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - UNICEF estimated that 66.2 percent of children ages 5 to 14 years were working in Togo in 2000. Children are found working in both urban and rural areas, particularly in family-based farming and small-scale trading. In rural areas, young children are sometimes placed in domestic work in exchange for a one-time fee of 15,000 to 20,000 CFA francs (USD 27.47 to 36.63) paid to their parents. Some children work in factories, and others work as hawkers or beggars in Lomé. Children are also employed as prostitutes in bars, restaurants and hotels.

Bur of Democracy, Human Rights & Labor - Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2005

TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS - There were reports that young girls were trafficked to Nigeria for prostitution.

The country was a transit point for children trafficked from Burkina Faso, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, and Nigeria. There were credible reports that Nigerian women and children were trafficked through the country to Europe (particularly Italy and the Netherlands) for the purpose of prostitution.

Concluding Observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) - 2005

[70] While noting the efforts made by the State party to prevent and combat sexual exploitation of children, the Committee is concerned that:

(a) little data is available on the extent and patterns of sexual exploitation and prostitution of children;

(b) that Existing legislation intended to protect children from sexual exploitation and prostitution is neither sufficient nor effective; and

(c) that child victims of sexual exploitation often do not receive adequate protection and/or recovery assistance.

Suffering to succeed - Violence and abuse in schools in Togo [PDF]

Sexually transmitted marks - One of the consequences of the proliferation of violence in Togolese schools is that there appears to be a crisis of confidence in the education system among schoolchildren themselves, certainly in the areas when Plan Togo conducted its research. None of the secondary schoolchildren we interviewed, from at least four schools, believes that the marks they receive at the end of term or end of year reflect the work they have done. There is a widespread belief that marks are the result of a series of trade-offs, mostly forced and unwanted, between pupil and teacher, which mean you pass or fail because:

• you’ve agreed to have sex with the teacher, or you’ve refused

• you’ve worked in the teacher’s fields, or you haven’t

• you’ve offered money and gifts to the teacher, or you haven’t

• you’re a boy who’s regarded by a male teacher as a competitor for a certain girl, so you’re marked down – or believe you’re marked down

Plan Togo has discovered that the expression ‘notes sexuellement transmissibles’ (sexually transmitted marks) is in widespread use in secondary schools. It’s a subtle play on words, but what it conveys is the conviction of secondary school students that success at school has very little to do with how clever or hard-working you are. And that suggests a complete lack of faith in teachers and in the education system as a whole.

Koranic schools in Senegal fuel child trafficking

Until recently most countries in West Africa did not have laws to penalize rape or child trafficking, although the situation was improving, Legrand said. But as one government cracked down on abuse, the problem moved to another country. A recent drive against child prostitution in Gambia had driven sex tourism to other parts of the region, such as Togo,

Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) - Summary Record of 1018th Meeting - 2005

[5] Ms. BOYOTI-N'DADIYA (Togo) said that the Government was aware of the involvement of cartels in child prostitution. It was difficult to identify child prostitutes because there were no official brothels. Investigative work was necessary in order to identify child prostitutes and to discover who was exploiting them.

ECPAT: Fifth Report on implementation of the Agenda for Action [DOC]

[B] COUNTRY UPDATES – TOGO – The government department Direction de la Protection et Promotion de la Famille et de l’Enfant reports that Togo’s national plan on child abuse and child trafficking has been helpful in the fight against CSEC. Civil society is more sensitized; the Department receives CSEC related complaints almost daily; law enforcement officers are more aware; and more perpetrators are being prosecuted. However, full implementation of the plan is still a problem because of financial difficulties.

Child Prostitution Goes Unchecked In Togo

Adjo is 11 years old and tries hard to look sexy in her black mini-skirt and skin-tight blue swimsuit top.  She told IRIN over a drink in a bar filled with cigarette smoke and drug dealers lurking in the background that she likes foreign customers best. They pay better and treat her more respectfully than Togolese men.

Child Trafficking in Togo: A Way Out

Sometimes, children are left to the lender as a pawn for a borrowed sum. They are, sometimes, left in exchange for money to a female or male agent without the parents having the chance to influence his fate after the deal. They are recruited or brought by agents in Togo and taken to Gabon or Nigeria and handed over to the employer they are assigned to. Some of them were employed to be used for prostitution.

Togo to clamp down on child prostitution

In Dekon, one of Lome's poor neighbourhoods, the Devissime or young girls' market as it is known in the local language Mina, is one of the city's busiest prostitution zones.

ECPAT:  CSEC in West Africa

SEX TOURISM - Child sex tourism has been reported in Togo and Benin, where hoteliers are known to be recruiting young girls to satisfy their customers’ sexual needs.

CONFRONTING THE PROBLEM - Increasingly governments are willing to acknowledge that CSEC is a growing problem within their borders, as well as the region, and are making efforts to combat it. The Togolese government, for example, has developed a national action plan on child trafficking and child abuse. The Department for the Protection and Promotion of the Family and of Children has been carrying out education and sensitization campaigns against sexual exploitation and the trafficking of children for sexual purposes. In addition, it has been cooperating with governments of neighboring countries, particularly Gabon, to remedy the situation.

NATIONAL ACTION PLAN - The Stockholm Declaration and Agenda for Action on the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children was adopted by 122 governments in 1996. Fourteen countries from West Africa committed themselves to developing national action plans on the issue by the year 2000. So far only Togo has done so.

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Human Trafficking in  [Togo]  [other countries]
Street Children in  [Togo]  [other countries]
Child Prostitution in  [Togo]  [other countries]