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By Christopher Oji
Stakeholders in security have called on the Federal Government to intensify the war against human trafficking by giving stiffer penalties to culprits.
The stakeholders, who spoke during the launch of a book “We are Priceless”, authored by award winning journalist, Juliana Francis, agreed that stiffer punishments to human traffickers would serve as a deterrent to others.
Former Senior Special Adviser to former president Muhammadu Buhari, Mr. Femi Adesina, said human trafficking has done serious havoc to families and suggested that traffickers caught by security agencies should be seriously punished and not allowed to go scot free.
The former Managing Editor, The Sun Publishing Limited praised Juliana Francis for taking time to publish the book “We are Priceless”, and called on the government to endorse it into the school curriculum, especially in secondary schools.
He said: “This is a great advocacy book in the war against child trafficking and some other anti-social acts in the country. The book should be adopted as resource material by the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) and other relevant security agencies. And if it ends in the school curriculum as a recommended text for secondary schools, it would also be a great idea.
“As the book highlights the evils of whoredom and child trafficking, it also traces the source majorly to dysfunctional families, poverty, lack of care for children, the get-rich-quick syndrome, and other ills.”
Chairman, Police Service Commission (PSC), Mr Solomon Arase, also asked the Federal Government to intensify the war against human trafficking, describing human trafficking as an organised crime that must be discouraged by the government. The former Inspector General of Police said the government must train and equip law enforcement officers to mitigate crime in the country.
“I feel happy that we are beginning to put on the table tropical issues that have to do with crime and criminality. This has been affecting the image of the country and a lot of people have lost their lives in the process of dealing with this issue of child abuse and taking them out of their habitat.
“And we are going to appeal to everybody to see how we can put this book in all the primary and secondary schools in the country. So that people will start learning the dangers of not taking care of our siblings.
“Parents must learn to profile people coming to take their children. You don’t just give your child to anybody and say he wants to take him or her to the city. You need to know what the person does for a living, his background and their pedigree.
“This is really an organised crime and it is something we have to really discourage, and we have to put our hands on it. We have to train our law enforcement officers to be able to know the signs of this crime, in order to mitigate the issue,” he said.
Author of the book, Juliana Francis, said: “It is a family book, whereby everybody can read and be able to educate somebody. Imagine a society where everyone is talking about one issue and reading the book and you are seeing the red flags.
“So, if someone is coming to say I’m taking your child abroad, you should be asking yourself what is the motive. I think the impact is that everybody should become more enlightened about issues that have to do with human trafficking.”
