Ekiti State government has tasked the National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) with the imperative of tackling the menace of human trafficking to protect the dignity of Ekiti citizens.
The state government called on NAPTIP to spread its dragnets to track down those plotting to make Ekiti one of the transit states.
The Commissioner for Youth Development in Ekiti State, Adesola Gold Adedayo, said this at the weekend while playing host to the leadership of NAPTIP who paid a visit to his office in Ado Ekiti.
Adedayo revealed that many victims of trafficking were being dangerously exposed to exploitation, prostitution, slavery and other nefarious acts that often subject them to all manners of harrowing experiences, deaths and untold sufferings.
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The commissioner lamented that many of the victims were mostly children of school age and those from less privileged backgrounds.
“Human trafficking is a crime against humanity. It is an infringement of the rights of the Nigerian citizens and Governor Oyebanji doesn’t want such an occurrence in the state.
“Most worrisome of this occurrence is the fact that the traffickers operate like syndicates. They have their rings in some of the states. In 2022, the Nigerian Immigration Service raised the alarm over the attempt by human traffickers to make Ekiti one of the transit states.
“But Governor Oyebanji won’t allow this to happen. We are very vigilant as a government. The lives of our people are very precious and valuable to us.”
In his submission, the NAPTIP Head of Operations, Ekiti Office, Mr Samson Ademola Oladimeji, praised the state government for partnering with the agency to nab traffickers and making Ekiti unsafe for their syndicates.
Oladimeji added that the agency was incurably committed to partnering with other sister agencies, particularly the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) to bring the incidences of trafficking in persons to the lowest ebb in the state.
