Nigerian Girls Narrate How They Escaped Prostitution

Two young girls, 25-year-old Franka Akhimen and 23-year-old Ehinon Onofua, were lucky to have escaped from a wild and dangerous life on the streets. The young ladies had been approached by an unidentified, suspected female trafficker at Ekpoma, Edo state, and offered work in a restaurant in Ivory Coast. They had ended up on the streets of Togo, where they were made to work as prostitutes, and were to remit the sum of 800,00 Cefas, to the lady, identified as ‘Madam Excellent’. she went out to buy clothes and came back with some skimpy and short dresses and gave them to us to wear. I asked why such dresses, because they don’t look like clothes that are worn by a waitress or a person selling food. Again she told me to keep quiet and just do whatever she asked me to do, adding that we were brought to Togo for prostitution and in return we get to pay her 800,000 cefas each. So, I told my sister, we can’t do this kind of job, we have to find a way to escape from her than to stay here. So, we left without even carrying our bags in order not to arouse any suspicion of us running away. 

with the help of Chief Christopher Obareki, a member of the board of trustees of ANC-GH with the sum of 800ghc to buy our tickets back to Lagos and also gave us N6,000 for our trip from Lagos to Edo state.” When asked if their family knew they were travelling with the unknown lady, here’s what they said:

 “Ehinon: we didn’t tell our parents because we wanted to surprise them by going to Ivory Coast to work and come back home with lots of money to help us start our businesses, because we just finished learning fashion and design, so we were hoping when we make money, we can come back to Nigeria and buy sewing machines and open our own place and that was a big mistake on our part. But Mr Moses Owaro spoke with my brother in Nigeria to explain the situation of things. So, currently our families are aware that we are in Ghana and will be returning home soon.” 
 The president of the All Nigerian Community-Ghana, Moses Owaro reportedly advised parents and guardians to be more careful and be on the lookout for  strangers who would offer to take their children abroad for ‘greener pastures’. He also advised security personnel to be extra careful and observant, especially at entry points, like the airport and the border, to be able to spot when young girls are being smuggled out.