The Executive Secretary of the National Commission on Small Arms and Light Weapons (NACSA), Dr Adam Bonaa, has estimated that 99 per cent of human trafficking cases are linked to organised criminal networks operating for financial gain.
He says most trafficking operations involve several individuals, including recruiters, middlemen and powerful figures who profit from exploiting vulnerable people.
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Speaking in an interview on GhanaWeb's Lowdown show, Dr Bonaa explained that although isolated cases of human trafficking exist, the majority are organised operations involving multiple actors.
“I can tell you off the top of my head that 99% of human trafficking cases are cartel-based,” he said.
“When I say they are cartel-based, it is people who tend to profit. But you would have that 1% that is just an isolated case,” he added.
Dr Bonaa cited the trafficking of children from communities around Ghana's coastal areas and locations near water bodies, where some are allegedly recruited and sold to work in fishing activities.
He also mentioned the Yeji and Atebubu areas as places where children are vulnerable to trafficking because of fishing activities along water bodies.
According to him, some of these children are taken from their communities and exploited, with intermediaries negotiating their movement and receiving payments from the people behind the operations.
He further identified alleged recruitment schemes associated with QNET and fake football opportunities abroad as other situations that could expose unsuspecting Ghanaians to trafficking.
On football-related trafficking, Dr Bonaa said some victims are lured with promises of soccer opportunities in countries such as Vietnam and Cambodia.
He explained that perpetrators sometimes take advantage of visa-free travel arrangements to move victims across borders.
“They tell you there's some soccer arrangement in Vietnam. They sit you in a plane. And some of these countries, fortunately, we are doing well, so we have a visa-free arrangement to some of these places. So the bad guy doesn't need a visa. All he needs is a ticket,” he said.
Dr Bonaa also linked organised trafficking and other criminal activities to the illegal circulation of firearms, explaining that weapons are often used by criminal networks to protect their operations.
He said the fight against trafficking requires stronger law enforcement and cooperation among security agencies to identify and dismantle the networks behind the activities.
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