Government has made no discernible progress in holding human trafficking offenders in Guyana accountable, the US State Department has said in its Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report for 2012 which also says that limited progress was made in preventing human trafficking during the reporting period.
Like in 2011, Guyana remains on Tier 2 in the latest report, which says that government does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so. “Guyana is a source and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to sex trafficking and forced labor. Guyanese nationals have been subjected to human trafficking in other countries in the Caribbean region. Cases of human trafficking reported in the media generally involved women and girls in forced prostitution,” the report said, echoing previous editions.
The government here, has in the past, taken a dim view of the report’s contents and in a statement responding to criticism by opposition leader David Granger of the administration’s efforts in combating TIP, the Ministry of Home Affairs’ ministerial task force on TIP yesterday said that government and its partners “have been able to reduce this menace to a bare minimum.”
The task force said that although trafficking in persons is “certainly not rampant” in Guyana, significant efforts have been adopted by government to combat this phenomenon. “In 2010 there were three victims, in 2011 two victims and in 2012 one victim to date,” the task force stated.
It said that one person has been convicted of TIP in the police’s hinterland ‘E and F’ Division for this year and, also for 2012, four persons are before the courts for the same offence.
According to the State Department, the government reported 13 trafficking reports during the reporting period but initiated only two new trafficking investigations. “Authorities reported no new prosecutions or convictions. Of two sex trafficking prosecutions initiated in previous years, one remained pending, and one was dismissed,” the report said.
It said that country experts expressed concern that exploitative child labour practices occur within the mining industry, agriculture, and forestry sector. “The limited government control of Guyana’s vast interior regions, combined with profits from gold mining and the prostitution that accompanies the industry provide conditions conducive for trafficking,” the report said. It added that people in domestic service are vulnerable to human trafficking and the common practice of poor, rural families sending children to live with higher-income family members or acquaintances in more populated areas creates conditions conducive to domestic servitude. Guyanese from rural, economically depressed areas are particularly vulnerable to trafficking in mining areas and urban centres. There is additional concern that young Brazilian women in prostitution are vulnerable to trafficking as well, the report says.
‘Obstacles’
It said that the government does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so. The report said that while the government demonstrated increased efforts to identify and assist trafficking victims, there were no prosecutions of trafficking offenders and there was no reported progress on prosecutions initiated in previous reporting periods, highlighting serious concerns about a lack of accountability for trafficking offenders in Guyana. “The absence of formal standard operating procedures to guide officials in victim identification and protection, disincentives for reporting and working on trafficking cases, as well as lack of action to address perceived official complicity, were also obstacles to progress,” the report said.
In terms of prosecution, the State Department said that the government made no discernible progress in holding human trafficking offenders in Guyana accountable during the reporting period. It noted the penalties under the Combating Trafficking of Persons Act of 2005 but said there were many challenges to achieving successful prosecutions here. “In almost all cases, the government treated trafficking as a summary offence in the lower courts, where cases are often dismissed, indicating a lack of severity assigned to the crime of trafficking,” the report said.
It added that the severe case backlog in the local legal system limits the efficiency and effectiveness of the system, while repeated delays in nearly all criminal prosecutions increased the likelihood that victims would become discouraged and cease cooperation as witnesses in trafficking prosecutions. Perceived corruption and low public confidence in the Guyana Police Force also were problems. “The government’s public insistence that human trafficking is not a significant problem in the country created a potential disincentive for police and court officials to address trafficking cases,” the report said, adding that there was evidence that people could be penalized for reporting suspected human trafficking crimes to the police citing media reports of the arrest of a mother immediately after she reported concern that her daughter was in forced prostitution.
In terms of protection, the State Department said that the government made efforts to protect victims of trafficking during the reporting period. It said that officials reported identifying 13 sex trafficking victims and assisting six of these during the reporting period, compared with three sex trafficking victims identified and assisted during the previous reporting period. However, an issue raised was that for another year, government did not identify any victims of forced labour, raising concerns that the government did not employ systematic procedures to guide front-line responders, such as police, mining officials, forestry officials, labour inspectors, and health officials, in identifying victims of human trafficking.
According to the report, trafficking victims in Guyana faced disincentives to seek help from authorities due to fear of retribution from trafficking offenders and fear of arrest.
It said that government estimated that it spent the equivalent of US$7500 toward trafficking victim assistance during the reporting period and the government had an unsigned memorandum of understanding with a domestic violence NGO in Georgetown to provide shelter and other assistance; the NGO assisted the six sex trafficking victims referred to it by authorities during the reporting period. There were no shelter facilities in other areas of the country.
It said that in accordance with Guyana’s anti-trafficking law, there are legal alternatives to the removal of foreign victims to their home countries where they may face hardship or retribution. “Highlighting the need for standard operating procedures to guide authorities in the identification and handling of potential trafficking cases, there was evidence that some potential trafficking victims were penalized for crimes committed as a result of being in a trafficking situation,” the report said. It cited an incident where following anti-trafficking raids of brothels in 2011, some foreign women in prostitution were jailed and deported immediately for immigration violations, without the involvement of an NGO or concerted efforts to identify possible trafficking victims.
‘Minimizing’ the problem
Meanwhile, the State Department said that the government made limited progress in preventing human trafficking during the reporting period. “The government continued to focus its public comments on the scope of Guyana’s trafficking problem, maintaining that it is limited, rather than fostering an open dialogue to build public awareness of the potential for trafficking and how to identify, report, and prevent cases,” it said. “Minimizing the existence of human trafficking hindered the progress of trafficking awareness campaigns, which were largely donor driven and funded,” it added.
The report said that an NGO that received government funding operated a hotline that had operators trained to assist trafficking victims. It said that the government has not updated its national action plan to combat trafficking in persons since 2005. Officials did not report any measures to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts during the reporting period. There were no reports that Guyana was a significant sex tourism destination, it added.
The State Department urged Guyana to boost efforts to hold trafficking offenders accountable by vigorously and appropriately investigating and prosecuting forced prostitution and forced labour, including police, customs, and immigration officers complicit in trafficking and in partnership with NGOs, develop standard operating procedures to guide and encourage frontline officials in the identification and protection of forced labour and forced prostitution, ensuring that victims are not punished for crimes committed as a result of being in a trafficking situation. It also urged the government to foster a climate of open dialogue on trafficking and encouraging people to come forward to authorities on potential cases; and consider developing a working level task force to complement the policy level task force that would be able to coordinate the day-to-day efforts of law enforcement, NGOs, prosecutors, as well as labour, health, mining, and forestry officials to address obstacles, plan strategy, and work together on specific cases.
US Ambassador to Guyana Brent Hardt, in a statement, said that over the years the US embassy here and the government have forged an “active and productive dialogue” on TIP, aimed at strengthening Guyana’s ability to prosecute offenders, protect victims and prevent future cases of TIP. The efforts reflect the commitment of Guyana to fight this threat, he said.
In its statement, the Ministry of Home Affairs’ ministerial task force on TIP outlined the efforts that have been taken to combat TIP including raids, training programmes, awareness programmes, monitoring of various locations, and strengthening the institutional infrastructure to respond to TIP. It said that a new successor plan has been developed to combat TIP. The statement said that Guyana has also developed a working relationship with neighbouring countries on a number of issues, including combating TIP.
