…NAPTIP Rescues 25,642 Victims, Secures 750 Convictions
The Federal Government has raised alarm over the alarming profitability of human trafficking, revealing that traffickers globally rake in a staggering $245 billion annually from sexual exploitation and forced labour.
Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), who made the revelation on Wednesday in Abuja, described the trade as a sophisticated, highly profitable and deeply entrenched criminal enterprise that threatens Nigeria’s national security and human capital development.
Quoting the 2023 report of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), Fagbemi disclosed that $169.9 billion is generated from sexual exploitation alone, while $75.9 billion comes from forced labour in the private sector, including domestic servitude.
He spoke during the 28th National Stakeholders Consultative Forum to mark the World Day Against Trafficking in Persons with the theme: “Human Trafficking is Organised Crime – End the Exploitation.”
According to the Minister, Nigeria remains a “source, transit and destination country” for human trafficking, and traffickers continue to insulate themselves from law enforcement through elaborate organisational structures.
“Human trafficking is not a random or opportunistic crime,” Fagbemi said. “It is organised, transnational, and carried out by criminal groups whose primary aim is economic profit from the exploitation of others — mostly women and children.”
While acknowledging the complexity of combating such networks, he praised the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) for making notable progress in tackling the crime.
“Since inception, NAPTIP has rescued 25,642 victims — 73.8 per cent of whom are females and 48.1 per cent children. The agency has arrested 11,406 suspects and secured 750 convictions, despite the legal and procedural hurdles in prosecuting such clandestine crimes,” he added.
The Director-General of NAPTIP, Prof. Fatima Waziri-Azi, said traffickers are now exploiting digital platforms to entrap vulnerable Nigerians, especially women, through deceptive loan-for-sex schemes, fake job offers, and scholarship scams.
“Desperate women are lured with false online loan promises and later coerced into prostitution under the guise of debt repayment,” Waziri-Azi revealed.
“Many others fall victim to sham employment or education offers abroad, only to be subjected to forced labour or sexual exploitation on arrival.”
She said the agency is currently working on implementing a national protocol for the identification, safe return, and rehabilitation of victims, which was approved by the Federal Executive Council in 2022.
In a related development, the Country Representative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Mr. Cheikh Toure, called for a centralised national trafficking data system to track criminal networks and improve intelligence sharing among stakeholders.
He emphasised that the battle against trafficking must be intelligence-driven, collaborative, and backed by real-time data for it to succeed.
Fagbemi assured that the Tinubu administration is expanding social intervention programmes, including conditional cash transfers and youth empowerment schemes, to address the economic desperation that traffickers exploit.
He also noted that Nigeria is strengthening mutual legal cooperation with other countries to ensure traffickers are prosecuted across borders, and their assets traced and confiscated.
“Human trafficking continues to undermine national security, fuel organised crime, and destroy futures. We must dismantle this industry,” Fagbemi said.
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