CHAD: 2006 TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS REPORT (PART I)

UNCLAS NDJAMENA 000337 SIPDIS SIPDIS DEPARTMENT FOR AF, AF/C, AF/RSA FOR HARPOLE, G/TIP FOR ZEITLIN, G, G/IWI;INR, DRL, DS/IP/AF, DS/IP/ITA; LONDON AND PARIS FOR AFRICAWATCHERS; DEPARTMENT PASS TO USAID AFR/SD/DG AND DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY AND TREASURY E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV PHUM KWMN KCRM SMIG KFRD ASEC PREF ELAB EAID, CD SUBJECT: CHAD: 2006 TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS REPORT (PART I) REF: A. STATE 2730889 ¶B. 05 NDJAMENA 386 ¶C. 05 NDJAMENA 387 ¶D. NDJAMENA 1343 ¶1. Summary. Despite severe resource constraints, the Government of Chad is taking steps to address problems of child trafficking which are commensurate with the scope and magnitude of the problem. Government officials are working on each of the elements of the Trafficking in Persons workplan to address the issues of child herders, child domestics, child beggars, and child prostitution. Answers are keyed to reftel's overview and prevention sections. Embassy's trafficking in persons point-of-contacts are P/E officer Kathleen FitzGibbon and P/E Assistant Joel Mbaibarem. Ms. FitzGibbon and Mr. Mbaibarem can be reached at (235) 51-70-09 or via e-mail at fitzgibbonka@state.gov and mbaibaremjx@state.gov. Two post officers spent 85 hours preparing this report. End Summary. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - OVERVIEW OF CHAD'S ANTI-TRAFFICKING PERFORMANCE - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ¶2. (21. A/B) Chad is a minor source, destination, and transit country for trafficking in children. Chad's trafficking problem involves the internal trafficking of children as herders, domestics, beggars, and prostitutes. There have been uncorroborated reports of Cameroonian and Central African Republic minors trafficked to Chad's oil producing region for prostitution. Government officials in Chad are investigating reports that Chadian children have been trafficked for begging purposes to Saudi Arabia during the hajj. Child herders follow traditional routes for the grazing of cattle and often cross international borders into Cameroon, Central African Republic, and Nigeria. There have been no changes in the direction of trafficking and there are no reports of adults being trafficked for labor or sexual exploitation. Children are generally put into trafficking situations by their own families, who knowingly or unknowingly "sell" or give their children to relatives or intermediaries to work as domestics or herders and marabouts for Islamic education. Most children are trafficked within Chad. Police sources do not have evidence of major trafficking networks, but work closely with Cameroonian border officials on cases of children who are taken across the border. (Note: N'Djamena, Chad, and Kousseri, Cameroon, are a 45-minute drive apart. End Note.) The Government acknowledges trafficking of children is a problem and has designated points-of-contact at the directorate level in the Ministries of Justice, Public Security, Social Action and Family, Labor, and Education. President Idriss Deby became more involved in the issue and took action against several Koranic schools for using children as forced laborers in September 2005. ¶3. (21. H continued) The Government and UNICEF have undertaken several studies of child labor and child trafficking. The most recent, a survey of child domestic workers, was completed in June 2005. The Government used its presentation to kick off a multi-city public awareness campaign. The Government also sponsored a workshop on the implications of the study for various government ministries in May. The study provided the first systematic examination of child domestic workers between the ages of five and eighteen. The study also explored the process through which children are placed in exploitative situations. In the majority of cases, poverty was cited as the key reason for seeking domestic employment. The majority of child workers (62 percent),according to the study, were boys. Young girls migrate to N'djamena from southern Chad to earn money to afford to buy cooking utensils and other household items in preparation for marriage in the villages. Most children who migrate into N'Djamena for work come from southern Chad, Logone Occidental and Oriental and Mandoul. Twenty-four percent of working children, in the study, were between the ages of eight and fourteen. Sixty-eight percent were between fifteen and seventeen years of age. Thirty-one percent of the child workers were never enrolled in school. Eighty-six percent could not read or write any language. Eleven percent could read or write in French and two percent in Arabic. Most children left school for financial reasons to seek apprenticeships. The report's recommendation includes: universal access to free education, stabilization of family situations, enforcement of government regulations prohibiting children from working, a multi-ministerial anti-child labor campaign in the countryside, particularly Mandoul, and protection measures to include centers for exploited children. ¶4. (21. H continued) This is the third survey the government has completed over the past five years on trafficking and trafficking-related situations. These surveys are the most reliable information available on the scope and magnitude of the problem. Collecting statistics and conducting surveys are difficult. The Ministry of Social Action and Family's 2004 survey involved 7,000 at-risk children to determine the level of intervention necessary to adequately address problems faced by children living in the streets, victims of sexual exploitation, and trafficking. It determined that there are some 1,500 to 2,000 boys trafficked as child herders, 500 boys and girls trafficked as child domestics, and 500 girls prostituted. The practice of child prostitution, according to the surveys, is one in which the perpetrators are often known to the family. Law enforcement officials have not found any networks or rings of commercial exploitation, but believe the activity is more organized than other forms of trafficking. The estimates of victims could grow as awareness of the different forms of trafficking is raised. ¶5. (21. C) The cash-strapped Chadian Government lacks the resources and capacity to address most social problems. As a result, the government officials have expressed willingness to provide in-kind contributions such as land, buildings for rehabilitation shelters, and social services for victims. Lack of paved roads, electricity, computers, and telephone coverage in most parts of the country makes it difficult for the Government to coordinate anti-trafficking efforts and collect information. Case documentation is kept in paper files, the ability to replicate and distribute is also constrained by sporadic electricity and lack of repair capacity. The capital, N'Djamena, often lacks electricity. Only the privileged have generators. Most information is collected through face-to-face meetings between officials during long, difficult road trips to the interior. It can take 3-5 days to drive to major towns in northern Chad. During the rainy season, the roads are often impassable and eastern Chad is intermittently cut off from the capital. Corruption at the highest levels of government has become an increasing problem. However, trafficking-related corruption is not a critical problem. The Government has difficulty paying civil servant salaries regularly. A dispute with the World Bank over changes to the oil revenue management law has cut off World Bank assistance to Chad and deposits of oil revenues into the government account. Chadian rebels, backed by the Government of Sudan, attacked Chad in December 2005. Much of the Government's resources are being spent on defending the border. ¶6. (21. D) The Government monitors the anti-trafficking activities of various ministries with each yearly budget cycle and participates on technical committees with UNICEF to evaluate joint protection efforts. The Director for Childen's Issues at the Ministry of Justice has begun pulling together anti-trafficking law enforcement statistics. The Director for Children's Issues at the Ministry of Social Action is responsible for overall monitoring of the issues. There is no formal, comprehensive annual anti-trafficking assessment that is issued to international and regional organizations. However, the two Ministries have prepared this type of report for international conferences and are in the process, with UNICEF's assistance, of preparing a report on Progress on Children's Rights, which includes a section on anti-trafficking, for the United Nations. ¶7. (22. A/B/H) The Chadian Government acknowledges its trafficking problem and is taking steps to raise public awareness, strengthen its law enforcement response, and to develop protection options for children. The Government lacks capacity and resources and works closely with UNICEF, religious institutions, and non-governmental organizations to raise public awareness and assist victims. Within the Chadian Government, there are officials in key ministries designated to handle issues related to children, child labor, and trafficking and who form an official working group. They include: Justice, Public Security, Labor, Education, and Social Action and Family, which houses a Special Protection Project that coordinates various governmental anti-trafficking activities. The mechanism for coordinating anti-trafficking is a multi-agency working group at the national level and technical committees at the regional and prefecture levels. To the best of its ability, the Government provides for anti-trafficking activities in the budgets of these departments. In 2004, the Government created a new Ministry for Moralization (i.e. Anti-Corruption) to investigate government corruption and promote anti-corruption as an important national value. ¶8. (22. C) In 2005, there were government-sponsored anti-trafficking information and education campaigns. The government-run television station has run several anti-trafficking documentaries about West and Central Africa, including a program on child herders, as well as discussions about the exploitation of children by marabouts on government-run radio. The government-owned daily newspaper has covered stories of child trafficking, forced begging, and exploitation of children as preachers by religious leaders in ¶2005. Government officials held several public awareness raising meetings in southern Chad for local communities on the dangers faced by child herders and domestics. The Ministries of Justice and Social Action educated key parliamentarians on the changes to the legal code pertaining to child trafficking and prostitution in August and September. Government officials and the High Islamic Council held meetings with imams and marabouts on the issue of child begging and forced child labor. Independent radio stations and newspapers also publicize the issue of trafficking. The Ministry of Labor held meetings with local communities in Goundi, Toulala, Doboti, and Koumra, the key source area for children trafficked into the capital for labor exploitation. ¶9. (22. D) The crux of the Government approach is prevention. The Ministries of Social Affairs and Health work closely with UNICEF on nationwide programs promoting education for girls, birth registrations, and microfinance programs. The Government is also following and IMF-backed poverty alleviation program. ¶10. (22. F) The Government has a good working relationship with NGOs and elements of civil society. For example, in cases where children are recovered as the result of trafficking or other abuse, police and border officials notify the Ministry of Justice and Social Action and human rights groups or religious institutions for victim assistance. Government and non-governmental organization personnel conduct joint missions to trafficking-prone areas and recently traveled together to Kribi, Cameroon, for an anti-trafficking workshop. P/E officer observed directly a situation in Moundou in which the police chief called a local human rights group to come to help with an abandoned child, believed to be an escaped child herder. In northeastern Chad, a trafficked child herder was discovered by Chadian military on patrol. The military commander in the region called in a national human rights group to assist with repatriating the child to his area of origin. ¶11. (22. G) The Government's monitoring of immigration as it relates to trafficking at the airport is improving. In 2005, immigration officials uncovered a potential case of child trafficking after noticing irregularities with the child's travel documentation. Chad is in the process of requiring that the photographs of children be put in the passports of their parents. Controlling Chad's expansive land borders is not possible. Border officials at Ngueli (with Kousseri, Cameroon) do search vehicles and have found children being trafficked across the border into Cameroon. While not systematic, there are attempts to monitor the situation. The Ministries of Justice, Public Security, and Social Action began training immigration, police, and customs officials on trafficking, how to recognize and investigate cases, and how to provide victim assistance in February 2005. The officials have asked for monthly seminars on different aspects of the issues, particularly victim protection. ¶12. (22. J) The Ministry of Social action and family has a National Plan of Action to Combat the Sexual Exploitation of Children and a plan to Combat the Worst Forms of Child Labor, which include the investigation of the scope and magnitude of the problem, provisions for public awareness-raising, legal protections for victims, and protection efforts. The Ministries of Justice, Public Security, Labor, Education, and Social Action and Family all have anti-trafficking components in their action plans that were derived from the Government's own surveys in conjunction with UNICEF and other relevant non-governmental organizations. WALL