…urged members of the public to disregard the report
The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) has debunked allegations made against the agency and Nigeria by the Human Rights Watch in its 2019 report on human trafficking.
The rights body, in a 90-page report released in Abuja, accused the anti-human trafficking agency of putting victims in detention camps, denying them necessary care and holding them in slavery-like conditions here in Nigeria.
The body in the report titled; “You Pray for Death: Trafficking of Women and Girls in Nigeria,’’ also accused the federal government of lack of clear cut policies and programmes that would improve conditions of trafficked victims.
In a swift reaction, Director General of NAPTIP, Dame Julie Okah-Donli, who debunked the allegations, also urged members of the public to disregard the report in its entirety for being false and aimed at tarnishing the image of NAPTIP and Nigeria.
Okah-Donli, who told newsmen that the report may not be unconnected with activities of enemies of the agency and traffickers, described the report as a mere figment of the imagination of the writers, adding that it fell below the standards in the operations of the agency’s shelters, as well as the standards for its victims’ support and assistance.
The DG, therefore, stressed that the agency observes all the world best practices in victims handling as enshrined by the Palermo Protocol, which includes that no victim shall be kept in a shelter against his or her will
