WORLD CUP ANTI-TIP INITIATIVES BY SOUTH AFRICAN

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 PRETORIA 000224 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PREL PGOV PREF PHUM KTIP SF SUBJECT: WORLD CUP ANTI-TIP INITIATIVES BY SOUTH AFRICAN NGOS REF: A. 09 PRETORIA 2578 ¶B. 09 PRETORIA 2229 -------------- Summary -------------- ¶1. At a January 25-27 "train the trainers" workshop on trafficking in persons (TIP),organized by World Hope South Africa (WHSA) under a grant from State/GTIP (ref A), participants from a dozen civil society groups prepared to step up their anti-TIP outreach in advance of the mid-2010 World Cup in South Africa. Initiatives ranged from poster campaigns and ongoing school visits, to programs to occupy children safely during the games, volunteer supervision of public fan parks, and even a new victim hotline. As this partial sampling from one province demonstrates, South African NGOs are gearing up to protect the potentially vulnerable, in a wide array of localized initiatives. End Summary. -------------- 2010-Focused Outreach -------------- ¶2. Anthony Ambrose of World Vision South Africa (WVSA) said his organization was active in six of the country's nine provinces, mainly in rural areas. WVSA was involved in an array of multi-level partnerships, such as a children's sector network (SANTAC) and the Child Protection Committee chaired by the Department of Social Development (DSD) which had formulated the official plan for child protection during World Cup. Ambrose noted that while the SAG had undertaken to provide security at stadia hosting the games, the informal fan parks were left to NGOs to protect. (Note: post security officer confirmed that while he expected a visible police presence at any large events for general security and crowd control, the police had never made mention of anti-TIP measures at those arenas. End note.) A consortium of civil society groups -- UNICEF, National Association of Child Care Workers (NACCW),Childline, Child Welfare, Nelson Mandela Children's Fund (NMCF),and one or two others -- had formed to prepare plans for "child friendly spaces" during the soccer games. Each of the soccer cities was assigned to an NGO as the lead agency to coordinate protection efforts (e.g. Polokwane to Childline, Soweto to World Vision, etc.). WVSA would link this World Cup plan to its ongoing neighborhood watch work, wherein community committees monitor the wellbeing and whereabouts of orphan headed households and other children considered vulnerable. ¶3. Robin Davis of the Tshwane Leadership Foundation (TLF) described how TLF had led the formation of an anti-trafficking coalition in the province of Gauteng (whose main cities are Johannesburg and Pretoria),launched last August to emulate those like Mpulimo (see below) and its peers in Western Cape (Cape Town) and Kwa Zulu Natal (Durban). The coalition's first focus was on the 2010 World Cup. It had laid out an implementation plan to raise awareness throughout downtown Pretoria, walking the city grid block by block to target caretakers of buildings, budget hotels, hair salons, taverns, and shopping centers. The group was flagging suspicious activities (e.g. persons milling around entries to ostensibly unused buildings),had befriended street prostitutes for information, and had identified locations which could be hotspots during the games. ¶4. "Captain" Magdeline Phore told how the Salvation Army had sent priests and volunteers to Germany to learn lessons from World Cup 2006, and those emissaries had returned to share the information in South Africa. The group was planning to mount big-screen football broadcasts in churches, where Qmount big-screen football broadcasts in churches, where teachers would also conduct classes over the extended school break during the games, and lay people were being trained to supervise kids' clubs and youth programs. Having identified particular "party streets" where youth might fall prey to traffickers, volunteers would be present to keep a watchful eye, talk to youth, and try to keep girls and boys safe. Since last year the Salvation Army had expanded its HIV/AIDS peer education to include TIP, especially in rural areas where the young could be especially vulnerable to fake job offers. The group also offered support to such job seekers, helping them to screen employers to ensure jobs were legitimate. TIP was now a theme in all of the group's outreach events, with a focus on prevention. ¶5. On January 27, while the workshop was ongoing, the Salvation Army launched a new hotline number, 0800-RESCUE, to PRETORIA 00000224 002 OF 002 assist TIP victims and receive tip-offs on trafficking. The line would be staffed by speakers of all 11 South African national languages. (Note: The line is currently not/not staffed in Portuguese, French, or native languages of adjacent countries for foreign victims. End note.) Contact was possible visa phone, fax, mail, or mobile phone text messaging. The number would be added to South African Police posters and materials. ¶6. Collette Bezuidenhout of the Girl Guides (local equivalent of U.S. Girl Scouts) described how its 8,000 members nationwide were engaged in anti-TIP education, to the extent that a new anti-trafficking badge had been created for significant achievement. Outreach was age-tailored, ranging from teddy bear talks and "stranger danger" lessons with small kids to peer education among teens by guides over 17 years of age. The group's networks spanned urban, suburban, and rural communities. The organization was working on designing anti-TIP posters and games. -------------- Ongoing Anti-TIP Efforts (2010 and Beyond) -------------- ¶7. Given Lekhuleni of Amazing Grace had recently moved from its well-known shelter in Mpumalanga near Mozambique (ref B) to assist with a sister shelter in Johannesburg. Since 2005, Amazing Grace has been engaged in victims' assistance, awareness raising, and lobbying for the rights of women and children. Last year it launched a "Red Light" anti-TIP campaign in partnership with a group called Junior Citizens. Amazing Grace is an anchor member of the 'Mpumlimo' (Mpumalanga-Limpopo-Mozambique) task team of regional NGOs against TIP -- a model of cross-border collaboration in an area especially prone to trafficking. Mpumlimo was in the process of expanding to include counterparts from Swaziland. It was working closely with the DSD on provincial anti-TIP planning for 2010 and beyond, and with the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) on their EC-funded research for the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) which leads the government's anti-TIP efforts. ¶8. Babalwa Makawula was from the New Life center in the difficult Johannesburg districts of Hillbrow and Berea, which opened in April 2005 as a drop-in and rehabilitation center for "women in trouble" and to help sex workers find a way out of prostitution. Working with the ILO, New Life was conducting "day and night" outreach with psychosocial support; with the SAG's Department of Health it was holding peer education seminars on HIV/AIDS. New Life was looking to weave anti-TIP messages into these programs. ¶9. Xenia Swanepoel represented Open Mind, a ministry-based organization initially working with the homeless and later expanding to assisting prostitutes and lately TIP victims. Security concerns had caused it to suspend its direct brothel contacts, but it continued it public advocacy role, speaking at conferences and public fora. -------------- Networking, More than Curriculum -------------- ¶10. Comment: Overall, the workshop was more impressive as a networking platform than for the training itself. WHSA will forward to G/TIP its training material. Poloff observed breakout group presentations on root causes of TIP and TIP's effects on individuals, families, communities, and countries -- fairly predictable discussions, so not reported here. (Note: G/TIP will be gratified that its tier ranking system Q(Note: G/TIP will be gratified that its tier ranking system has an impact: without mentioning the TIP Report by name, NGOs included among the country effects the negative image of being "poorly graded" by the rest of the world. End Note.) In another session, participants discussed a "walkabout" exercise in which they had taken note of risks and threats in their neighborhoods, as well as resources for safety and help. There were about 15 participants in the workshop, which WHSA said it would have to duplicate because of being doubly oversubscribed. End Comment. GIPS