Woman trafficked in Myanmar scam awarded Sh7.3 million

Some of the 78 Kenyans arrive at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, Nairobi, after being rescued from Myanmar, on April 5, 2025[File-Standard]

A Kisii court has awarded a woman Sh7.37 million for being trafficked to a notorious scamp in Myanmar where she was  forced to work 17-hour days running online cryptocurrency fraud schemes.

The landmark judgment delivered on July 8, Employment and Labour Relations Court Judge Nzioki wa Makau ruled that Mariera Bosibori, a vegetable trader from Nyanchwa in Kisii county was deceived into travelling abroad for work by Asha Hassan, who is listed as a respondent, only to be trafficked to Myanmar.

Judge Makau found out that she was subjected to slavery, servitude, forced labour,  forced criminality and human trafficking after a recruiter falsely promised her a lucrative food-packing job in Thailand paying USd2,000 (approximately Sh258,000) a month.

The court awarded Bosibori Sh5 million as compensation for trafficking, USD 8,000 in unpaid salary for the four months she was held captive, Sh300, 000 being a refund of recruitment fees, Sh15,095 for her confiscated phone, Sh21,011 as interest on a loan she had taken to finance the recruitment fees and Sh1 million in exemplary damages.

The court also directed the National Employment Authority (NEA) to strengthen monitoring of illegal labour recruiters, including conducting online surveillance and increased monitoring at Kenya’s exit points as traffickers increasingly exploit digital platforms to lure job seekers.

The judgment which laid bare the sophisticated trafficking syndicates operating in Southeast Asia where Kenyans are increasingly being lured into transnational criminal syndicates by promises of well-paying jobs.

Many victims are recruited through social media, messaging applications and informal employment agents who promise lucrative jobs in customer service, hospitality or manufacturing before transporting victims into scam compounds where they are forced to commit cyber fraud.

Bosibori’s ordeal began in November 2024, when she was referred to Hasan by a friend. At the time, she was eking out a living selling vegetables at Nyanchwa market in Kisii, struggling to make ends meet. She then began searching for better employment opportunities and that’s when she was refeed to Hasan.

According to Justice Makau, Hasan falsely presented herself as the operator of a licensed overseas recruitment agency with access to employment opportunities and offered her what appeared to be a life-changing opportunity.

To secure the job and to process a Thai work visa, Hasan demanded Sh300,000 as facilitation fees, which Bosibori paid through a combination of cash, electronic transfers, and loan from her SACCO, convinced she was about to transform her family’s fortunes.

But instead of receiving the promised work visa, she was issued with a visitor’s visa. When she raised concerns, Hasan assured her the visa would be converted to a work permit upon arrival in Thailand.

On December 4, 2024, Bosibori travelled to Thailand alongside ten other Kenyans. What awaited her was not the factory job she had been promised, but a start of a nightmare of modern-day slavery.

Upon arrival in Bangkok, the group was received by Chinese nationals who transported them for several hours before secretly ferrying them across the Moei River at night, into neighbouring Myanmar.

Across the border, armed guards escorted them to a heavily guarded compounded where they were held captive. That is when the horrors of her enslavement and servitude began.

“Instead of the promised food-packing job, she was compelled to participate in organised online fraud schemes,” judge Makau said.

The court heard that traffickers assigned her a false identity, required her to create fraudulent online accounts, provided her with mobile phones and trained her to deceive unsuspecting victims, mainly in United States, by posing as a wealthy investor interested in purchasing high-value real estate before introducing cryptocurrency investment schemes.

She alleged that the information obtained from the targets was then passed to supervisors to perpetuate the fraud.

The judge found that Bosibori had become part of an organised criminal enterprise against her will. Throughout her captivity, she endured relentless abuse.

“The Petitioner further contends that while confined in Myanmar she was subjected to forced labour, physical assault, psychological abuse, intimidation and threats. She was required to work for approximately 17 hours daily without remuneration,” said Makau.

Failure to meet assigned targets attracted punishments including beatings, electric shocks, denial of food, prolonged physical punishment and denial of medical treatment.

Her mobile phone was confiscated, preventing her from contacting her family members and authorities. Despite working for several months, she received no salary.

Medical reports produced before court corroborated the physical abuse she suffered.

The judge observed that her ordeal illustrated the extreme vulnerability trafficking victims face once taken outside their home countries.

“One can only imagine the horror of violence meted out to one abroad. This must have been one of the most traumatic of experiences and given the fact that her phone had been confiscated and she could not reach out to authorities either here or in Thailand. She was at the mercy of her abductors,” Makau asserted.

Bosibori’s only salvation came on March 19,2025 when she was rescued by military forces and repatriated to Kenya.

“Upon her return, she discovered that the Respondent was not a licensed employment agency, had not obtained the requisite permits to deploy workers abroad and had never provided her with a written contract of employment before her departure,” Makau said.

The judge emphasized that; The respondent was not cruel but callous in the manner she treated the petitioner and subjected her to slavery, servitude, human trafficking, forced labour and forced criminality contrary to the Employment Act, the Labour Institutions Act and the Counter Trafficking in Persons Act.

He also ruled that Hasan violated Bosibori’s constitutional rights to dignity, freedom of movement, security of the person and fair labour practices, and subjected her to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.

Judge Makau ordered the National Employment Authority should check its database and ensure the Respondent is not permitted to operate a recruitment agency within Kenya for having participated in trafficking of persons.

In his judgment, Justice Makau concluded that the trafficking did not begin in Myanmar but in Kenya, when Bosibori was deceived into believing legitimate employment awaited her.

The judge held that the respondent deliberately misrepresented herself as a licensed recruiter despite knowing no food-packing job existed.

“The Respondent’s false representation of operating an employment agency and promising the Petitioner employment as a food packer in Thailand when the Respondent knew full well that no such job existed establishes deceptive recruitment contrary to section 3(d) of the Counter Trafficking in Persons Act.”

He further ruled that demanding Sh300,000 in facilitation fees and falsely assuring Bosibori that her visitor’s visa would later become a work permit formed part of the trafficking scheme.

“This was equally part of the deception and was calculated to result in only one thing – the enslavement of the Petitioner. The fact the Respondent participated in orchestrating her delivery to Myanmar, there is ample proof the Respondent participated in the Petitioner's trafficking,” Makau ruled.

The court found that by recruiting Bosibori, collecting recruitment fees and facilitating her departure from Kenya, the respondent had triggered the chain of events that ultimately led to her enslavement in Myanmar.

Notably, the judge ruled that a trafficker does not have to personally participate in every stage of trafficking to bear responsibility.

“It is my finding that participation in any one stage of the trafficking process is sufficient to establish liability,” he added.

Justice Makau further observed that Bosibori’s fate could have been far worse had security agencies not rescued her.

“She could easily have been trafficked out of Myanmar for she was no longer a free person but a prisoner at the mercy of her captors who forced her to partake of criminal activities by luring unsuspecting members of the public to invest in curated crypto currencies with the sole aim of defrauding them,” he added.

Although the National Employment Authority was not held liable because the recruiter had never been registered, the judge warned the agency about the changing nature of labour trafficking.

He acknowledged that the authority could not regulate an agency that operated entirely outside the law. However, he emphasized that regulators must evolve alongside traffickers calling on more monitoring and enforcing the law against rogue agents.

“It is important to note the modes of recruitment are constantly evolving necessitating the inclusion of fresh roles such as online monitoring, surveillance at points of exit and the like to ensure there is a collation of the information gathered on the illegal recruiters.”

He also directed the authority to ensure Hasan is never allowed to operate a recruitment agency in Kenya.

“The National Employment Authority should check its database and ensure the Respondent is not permitted to operate a recruitment agency within Kenya for having participated in trafficking of persons,” the judge ruled.

In a letter addressed to Thai police by the Civil Society Network for Human Trafficking Victim Assistance (CSNHTV), more than 5,300 people including 20 Kenyans are trapped n scam centers operating near Mynmar’s border with Thailand.

Other victims include nationals from Uganda, Rwanda and Zimbabwe