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A Voice For the Voiceless

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The Advocacy Project seeks to help community-based advocates produce, disseminate and use information, and so become more effective advocates for human rights and social justice

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On the Streets of Italy

Rachel is another young woman who managed to escape from traffickers and agreed to meet with The Advocacy Project. Hers is a shocking story, full of violence and abuse.

Rachel was living in Benin City with her sister when she was approached by a man who asked if she would like to go abroad and earn money. After a long and roundabout route she arrived in Rome, where she met her pimp, named "Madam Agnes." She was shocked to learn that she was expected to earn $50,000 dollars from prostitution, or be denounced to the police as an illegal immigrant. At the going rate that would have meant sex with several partners a day for three years. 

She was shocked to learn that she was expected to earn $50,000 dollars from prostitution, or be denounced to the police as an illegal immigrant. At the going rate that would have meant sex with several partners a day for three years.

Rachel tried to escape, but to no avail. After three weeks on the streets, a client drove her to the patch of empty ground. After having sex with Rachel in his car, he told her to hand over all of her earnings from the day. She kept her earnings in a sock and gave him an empty purse. He started to curse and hit her, whereupon she managed to open the door and start running. He started the car and drove it right at her, knocking her down. Luckily he then drove off. Luckily, because as she knows only too well, she could have been killed.

Covered in blood and crying, Rachel then walked back to the corner where she worked. In retrospect, it seems amazing that she returned. It shows how totally cowed she had been by her experience and by the fearsome Madam Agnes.

Rachel was rescued by a group of modern Samaritans from the Catholic group Caritas, who patrol the streets of Rome every Wednesday in an attempt to check up on the prostitutes. They quickly realized that Rachel was sick and asked her to go to a hospital with them.

At first Rachel refused: "I thought I would not be able to afford treatment." They insisted gently and told her that the treatment would be free. Even ensconced in a hospital bed, Rachel was reluctant to sleep, afraid of how Madam would react. The staff carried out medical tests, which presumably included a test for sexually transmitted diseases and even HIV-AIDS.

Rachel's five days in the hospital finally broke the grip of Madam Agnes. The Caritas group asked if Rachel wanted to return to Nigeria and offered to help. She was taken to a convent in Rome, where she stayed for several days with two other girls. She then went to the Nigerian embassy in Rome and to the office of the International Organization of Migration, to collect the necessary documents and ticket.

As it happens, the head of the order of sisters that was receiving girls back in Benin City, Sister Cecilia, was visiting Italy for a conference. Sister Cecilia was happy to bring Rachel back home with her. Rachel stayed briefly in Lagos, before returning to her village, Ogwe, for an emotional reunion with her family, says Cecilia.

In one final act of pure malice, Madam Agnes had phoned Rachel's family after she had escaped and told them that she had been killed. When Rachel returned home, alive and well, they were overjoyed. They were also bitterly angry-so angry, in fact, that they went in person to confront the brother of Agnes. He was living in Benin City and had arranged for the departure of their child two months earlier.

Rachel's story rings true to most Nigerians, who now understand that life on the streets of Italy for a Nigerian prostitute is fraught with abuse and danger. The wife of the Governor of Edo State recently announced that 116 prostitutes were reported killed in Italy between 1994 and 1998.

Publicizing the risk to prostitutes may discourage new recruits, but it also highlights the indifference of the Italian authorities. On paper at least, Italian law attempts to prohibit trafficking and other forms of abuses, without punishing the prostitutes. In practice, it appears to leave young women like Rachel, who are forced into prostitution, utterly defenseless. As of June 2000, only one suspected Italian trafficker had been arrested, and that happened in Nigeria. There is very little protection for girls like Rachel, except that offered by charities.

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