THE KUWAITI GOVERNMENT IS MAINTAINING DEAFENING SILENCE ABOUT HUMAN TRAFFICKED ZIMBABWEAN WOMEN. No single Kuwaiti citizen is publicly condemning the forced commercial sex and labor exploitation of Zimbabwean women recently trafficked in Kuwait. No single culprit has been arrested in Kuwait. Kuwait based immigration officials and embassy staff in Zimbabwe were involved in this crime against humanity.
The exportation of more than 200 Zimbabwean women to Kuwait is continuation of the 19th century slavery of Africans by Arab slave traders. Victims must speak out. At the center of human trafficking is fraud, force and coercion.
Zimbabwean Minister of Women’s Affairs, Gender and Community Development Nyasha Chikwinya reported that some recruiting agents based in Harare were intimidating the rescued victims not to reveal what they had been through. The fact that the government of Kuwait is not issuing any statements or publicly condemning this gross violation of human rights of Africans proves that Kuwait is consenting to this forced commercial sex and forced labor of African women.
When the women arrived in Kuwait they had their cellphones and passports seized. Some were put on a market and sold for sex purposes and domestic servitude. One woman victim related to the Herald Newspaper (in Harare) how she was forced to sleep with 10 man a day in order to generate income for the Arab man. According to the USA state Department human trafficking generates more than $30 billion a year and has more than 28 million victims worldwide.
About 70 Zimbabwean women have returned from Kuwait through the help of Zimbabwe embassy and NGOs but many still remain as sex and labor slaves in Kuwait and more pressure and publicity is needed to bring back these victims.
We should condemn human trafficking in strongest terms and rise up against this degradation of African women in Kuwait. Human Trafficking Task Forces planning to stage a demonstration at the Kuwait embassy in Pretoria South Africa.
South Africa Today – South Africa News
