here - Cooperazione Italiana allo Sviluppo

The increase of information and awareness on the part of the girls alreadypresent on Italian territory, and the considerable number of those who leaveNigeria, means that these are becoming more difficult to manage by theorganisation of the madam.This is one of the reasons why since three or four years the recruiters prefer tocontact even younger girls coming from villages in the rural areas where there ismuch poverty, the information available is scarce and where the ties represented bythe wodoo rituals are still very strong.“In Nigeria it is known, but the problem is that the pimps have changed theirideas, they no longer go to the city to get girls, they go to the small villages wherethe story has not yet arrived” (Interview Victim No.4).“However there is some that live in the country and who do not know what it isto make prostitution in Italy. So in these years pimps went to the country, to takethe girls to bring them here. Because in the country they don’t know that hereprostitution is made” (Interview Victim No.8).These women are extremely weak subjects both from the cultural and materialpoint of view and therefore easy to manage and subdue.The evidence collected by the operators agree that the active role is often that ofclose relations, the extended family or members of the community in the processwhich brings the victims to start along the road of the traffic and of prostitution.The relationship with the family appears frequently as a decisive step, even if thetype of pressure exerted on the victim is extremely variable.In some cases a decisive role is played by the mother of the girl who, althoughknowing the type of work offered to the daughter, reasons that the choice is madeout of the necessity that a member of the family sacrifices herself for the well beingof the entire family nucleus.In other cases it is the extended family that is the determining support andstimulus. For example the uncles and aunts, that is to say persons who are linkedby close ties or who frequent each other, to take on the function of the first contactwith those who organise the journey and to reassure the girl, they wait to recruit,and her family. In this case the deception appears as treachery of the faith given toa person they consider worthy of this faith. There are different judgements whichappear on the part of the victims: passing from a heavy condemnation of the familymember who deceived them to the thought that even they are an unconsciousvictim of the recruitment system.The evidence therefore shows heterogeneous actions managed by differentmeans and with diverse interests. In very many cases the pressure on the girl arethose of moral duties which bind the members of the extended family. But at thebase of the choice there is nearly always a pressing economic need: the poverty ofthe family, a close member of family sick and in need of medicine, theimpossibility of obtaining health assistance because of the high costs, etc. But themost important parameter is the mirage of a rapid personal and family socialascent, possibly thanks to the remittances of the girl.