Child traffickers using church

By Kenan Miruka and Nick Oluoch Cases of child rights violation continue to rise along the Kenya-Tanzania border. The most common child rights violations include defilement, early marriages and sexual exploitation where underage girls are trafficked from Tanzania and rural Nyanza to work in towns as prostitutes.A recent case in Gucha where a pastor was arrested for allegedly facilitating child trafficking has added a new dimension. The pastor who operates a church in Kenya and another branch in Tanzania was involved in the trafficking of an 11-year-old girl from Tanzania.Children’s officers rescued the girl from a residential house in Ogembo town where she was working as a house help. Two people including a teacher recorded statements over the matter.The child was reportedly trafficked from Ukeleni District, Tanzania into Kenya on August 30 and taken to the pastor’s home in Kenyenya District.On interrogation, the pastor claimed that he was given the child by her uncle in Tanzania who wanted her to pursue education in Kenya.Illegal entryA teacher in whose house the child was found claimed the Tanzanian national was brought by his wife to keep company to her school going child.Investigations by police officers and the Children’s Department revealed the child was in the country illegally.Gucha District Children’s Officer Caleb Makatiani took the child to a Child Protection Unit at Ogembo Police Station as investigations continued. The pastor claimed he handed over the child to the teacher so that she could be taken to school next year."This is the second child I have brought from that country as I have another boy in form one," argued the pastor.The pastor had no documents allowing the child to stay in Kenya. "Investigations indicate this could be part of a syndicate of cross border child trafficking," said Makatiani.The clergyman was released on bond and directed to produce the child’s parents to explain how she left the country ending up in Kenya.A week later, the child’s father Ayub Mtalime appeared in court where children’s officers obtained a repatriation order directing him to take the child back home."In the event that the parents have the desire for the child to school in Kenya, proper legal procedures should be followed," the court ordered.Investigations by The Underworld reveal the church has previously been involved in trafficking children from Tanzania to Kenya and handing them over to homes to work as house helps or farmhands.Through church faithful, vulnerable children are identified and promised good education once they arrive in Kenya only to be handed over to families seeking house helps.Cross border child trafficking is rampant along the Kenya-Tanzania border.Early this year, police and the Children Department in Kuria West District in Migori County had to launch a man-hunt for a man suspected to have hatched a plan to sell his albino daughter in Tanzania for Sh1 million.According to the Kuria West District children’s officer John Langat, his office had received reports that the man was trying to sell his two-year-old daughter who had been born with albinism.ProstitutionThe man’s wife whom he constantly quarreled over her refusal to let go the baby is said to have reported the matter two weeks ago to the children’s office. This prompted the officer to immediately launch a rescue mission for the toddler.Mr Langat said the mother was later forced to move out of the home after being chased away with their two children for being tough-headed and refusing to go along with the plan.And recently, two women in the same region were locked up in a bitter war over a seven-year-old girl child described by the children’s office as a victim of human trafficking syndicate.According to Langat, the wrangles between the two women are believed to have started after a business gone sour between the parties.Langat suspects that the toddler was sold for a paltry Sh10,000 in a discrete transaction believed to have taken place in an estate in Kericho town two years ago.Caroline Okere, the chairperson of Gender Violence and Girl Child Network in Migori County says cases of child trafficking across the Kenya-Tanzania border are rife."It is difficult to identify traffickers as some pose as owners of orphanages and homes for the destitute. Some pass through the border claiming the children belong to their relatives," she says.She adds: "I recently received two children who were directed to my home after escaping from their captors. The children hailed from Tanzania and we managed to hand them over to their country’s authorities with the help of police."She says most of the female victims end up working in discreet brothels in Kuria, Migori and Transmara districts as well as Isebania border.

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