NAPTIP commences investigation of deported women from Mali

The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons has commenced investigation into the trafficking into Mali of the 37 female Nigerians who were on Monday deported to Nigeria by the Malian Authorities.
Four female suspects were also deported with the victims.
While the victims are being counseled by NAPTIP counselors, the suspects are in NAPTIP custody and making useful statements. The Malian Police had on February 16, 2017 rescued the Nigerian girls, aged 15 to 32, being used as sex slaves in Koflatie, an area in Northern Mali reportedly notorious for prostitution.
Five female suspects – four Nigerians and a Ghanaian – were also arrested in the course of the raid. Investigations into the matter commenced before the deportation as investigators from the Agency, who are also members of the Joint Border Task Force, had as soon as the Malian Authorities reached the Agency through the National Crime Agency of the United Kingdom, gone to Mali to profile, debrief and interview the victims and suspects preparatory to their return. The invitation of the NAPTIP-JBTF team was necessitated by the need to bring to bear the Nigerian experience on handling human trafficking cases; in identifying and to substantiate points to prove acts of human trafficking in the Malian case. The repatriation of the Nigerians was greatly assisted by the Defence Headquarters, which tasked the Nigerian Air Force to help in bringing back the girls who were already posing a security risk to Mali.
Reports indicate that over 5,000 Nigerians are presently in different parts of Mali being forced into prostitution by their traffickers who had lured them to Mali with the promise of helping them to Europe. The girls, who arrived the Air Force Base of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos in a Nigerian Air Force plane on Monday evening, were received by a joint operations team comprising officials of NAPTIP, the Military, Police, Department of State Services, Nigeria Immigration Service, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria and the Special Assistant to the President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa. Speaking to the top management of the Agency on the Malian case, the Acting Director-General of NAPTIP, Abdulrazak Dangiri, directed that investigation into the trafficking of the 37 girls must be thorough, adding that sloppiness would not be tolerated.
While thanking all those who played one role or the other in achieving a successful return of the women, Dangiri thanked the Federal Government for the quick intervention through the Defence Headquarters.
He however, stated that the Agency was putting in place measures that would be presented to government to ensure that all other victims stranded in Mali and other parts of Africa are rescued and brought back to Nigeria. It may be recalled that this will not be the first time that the Nigerian Government would help in evacuating Nigerian victims of human trafficking from Mali.
In 2012, NAPTIP, with support from the Office of the National Security Adviser to the President, evacuated 104 persons from Mali in an operation tagged: “Operation Timbuktu.”