Security

We will monitor NGOs receiving UN funding meant for fighting child trafficking – NAPTIP

Published

3 years ago

2020/11/10

The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons on Monday said it would monitor non-governmental organisations receiving the United Nations support funds meant for the fight against human trafficking in Nigeria.

The NAPTIP Director-General Julie Okah-Donli, said this on Monday in Abuja at a stakeholders’ validation programme of the agency’s gender policy.

“For a long time, Nigeria has been a beneficiary of this very important UN voluntary funds because UN women work with NGOs whose activities are concerned with human trafficking, but we were not aware.

“But now that I am in, we will monitor some of the NGOs that were listed because we are not not even sure if they are registered with Network of Civil Society Organisation Against Child Trafficking, Abuse and Labour (NACTAL).”

She said the validation of the policy document to tackle human trafficking was part of the NAPTIP’s desire to eliminate all forms of gender discrimination in its activities.

Nigeria remains a source, transit and destination country when it comes to human trafficking, according to the 2020 U.S. State Department Trafficking In Persons Report.

In the latest Global Slavery Index (2018) Report, Nigeria ranks 32/167 of the countries with the highest number of slaves – 1,386,000 and NAPTIP reports that the average age of trafficked children in Nigeria, recently downgraded to a Tier 2 Watch country on the U.S. State Department’s Trafficking In Persons Report (2020), is 15.