VIDEO: Ending human trafficking one step at a time
RANDBURG – The team started the journey by joining in the Makana Bricks Fun Run in Grahamstown on 5 March and visited Addo Elephant Park, Port Elizabeth, Graaff-Reinet, Gariep Dam, Bloemfontein, Hartswater, Potchefstroom and Johannesburg.
Oasis South Africa visited the Randburg taxi rank on 14 March to raise awareness on human trafficking.
“Human trafficking is a rising crime in South Africa. It is a crime against humanity that devastates the lives of children, women, men, whole families and whole communities,” said Emay van-Wijk of Oasis South Africa.
According to Van Wijk, South Africa is a source, transit and destination country for human trafficking and the growing exploitation of women and children into the sex industry in South Africa is a particularly major concern.
‘In the long run’ is an initiative by Oasis, a non-governmental organisation, to run international human trafficking routes throughout the world to help end human trafficking and raise people’s awareness of the dangers that are out there and the exploitation that is happening.
“For 10 consecutive days a team ran an enduring minimum of 10km each, every day, along a series of routes starting in the Eastern Cape and moving to Gauteng,” said Van-Wijk.
All along the route the team met with local communities and raised awareness of this potential exploitation.
“It is clear that many young South African women are being lured from rural areas and exploited in the cities of Durban, Cape Town, Bloemfontein and Johannesburg,” she said.
WATCH VIDEO of a story about *Grizelda who was abused. She was invited to stay with a friend in Johannesburg.
The friend took her to a sparsely furnished room and then left her. She never saw this woman she thought was her friend again.
Grizelda talks of her ‘first three men’.
After that she tells of “being taped up and clear naked in a dark room, your hands cuffed for two weeks, no food, no nothing, you smell just like semen,” said Grizelda.
Van-Wijk mentioned that this is not an uncommon story and said too often women are promised work, or are simply treated to a holiday by friends.
“On arrival, or en route, they are held captive, tortured and raped. They are then forced to take drugs and are used until a new woman can be found. At which point they find themselves trapped in the sex industry to pay for a drug habit, and with the legacy of shame about what has happened to them.”
There is also Candice’s story, which is another such example of how human trafficking is rising in South Africa,
* Women’s surnames are not identified for their security reasons.
