GIS grabs four suspects for human trafficking

The Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) has intercepted 44 Ghanaian teenage girls at the Aflao and the Segbe Border Post in the Volta Region enroute to Saudi Arabia to be employed as house helps through Togo, Benin and Nigeria.

An official statement to Senior Inspector Gifty Amgborme, GIS Public Affairs Department, two of the suspected traffickers are Ghanaians and the other two are drivers (Nigerians) who were accompanying the victims and attempting to traffic the girls are in the custody of the GIS helping in investigations for prosecution.

She said preliminary investigations indicated that, the suspected traffickers promised the girls lucrative jobs and recruited them without telling their parents the truth about their journey.

“It was also revealed that one Mohammed Nasiru, a Ghanaian suspected notorious trafficker, told some of the girls that he was sending them for a Moslem programme in Nigeria.

“Some of the victims on board Go-Express bus which plies that road to Nigeria recounted how their visas and passports were acquired for them without being asked to pay for anything by the suspected traffickers and transport fares to Nigeria also paid for on their behalf.

Some of these innocent victims also claim to have made enquiries themselves about advertisements through the media on supposed lucrative jobs in the Gulf Area for young girls and became interested to embark on the journey to seek for the so called ´greener pastures ´ or lucrative jobs,” she added.

Senior Inspector Amgborme said the arrest came shortly after Government’s directive to ban travelling of all Ghanaian teenage girls wishing to travel to the Gulf areas through the Kotoka International Airport (KIA).

She noted the directive has since disrupted activities of smugglers and human traffickers’ ´businesses.

She said the GIS was not taking chances and has since put in place more stringent measures at the KIA to curb the menace.

These measures, she said had forced the traffickers to use the land borders as alternative routes.

“Meanwhile personnel of the Border Patrol Unit has been put on high alert to lookout for suspected traffickers or agents who may attempt using any unapproved or approved routes to engage in this illicit business.

“The general public is also cautioned to be weary of unscrupulous persons promising them lucrative jobs outside the country especially to the Gulf areas,” she added.