Malawian man escapes trafficker who tricked him through Facebook
A 20 year-old Yohane Kamwendo from Area 9 Machinjiri Blantyre on Wednesday last week escaped his traffickers in Zambia after learning that he was trafficked and not taken to be employed as promised earlier.
Kamwendo said he learnt that he was trafficked from a guard at a certain place in Chipata where he was held innocently waiting for a boss to come and tell him his job description.
“I come from Blantyre. I found myself in Zambia after a friend I met two weeks ago on Facebook told me that there was job opportunity in Zambia with good pay and that I will go there without passport because he had already arranged for that,” he said.
Kamwendo said it took the guard’s mercy at a place he was kept to inform him that there was no job for him there, but that when albinos go to that place they never come back as they are sold somewhere or some fishy business happens to them because when they enter the house they never come back.
“I never thought that this friend was selling me to the place we went to. He just told me to wait outside as he went to meet the boss and it was the guard at that place who told me that I was up for sale because I’m an albino and was told to escape,” he said.
He said the guard gave him K1, 200 to escape and use routes which he couldn’t be traced because they would come looking for him and it would be a disaster.
Kamwendo said he first met Banda in Blantyre two days after their interaction on Facebook after which he told him of the deal in Zambia.
He said he felt for the trap because the man knew he was struggling to raise fees for his studies as his family members didn’t show interest in helping him because albinism.
“I mostly feel neglected by my family members, for no apparent reasons they feel nothing for me, I decided to do things on my own and that’s why I decided to try the Zambian deal with this friend I met on FB, I was so excited and my parents allowed me to go,” he said.
Kamwendo arrived in Malawi from Chipata on Sunday and spent a night at Mchinji Police victim support unit department.
Mchinji Social Welfare Office has provided transport to Kamwendo back to Blantyre where he stays.
Human trafficking still poses a major threat to Malawi as most trafficked people do so knowingly with the hope that they will find greener pastures. Parents consent the trafficking of their children due to poverty.
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